Hi no Nami: The Game of Life
by MewWinx96
Summary: The Game of Life binds us all, pupating us with invisible strings. God gazes on the spectacle, and the dice roll... (No lemon, but definitely not for kids.)
1. Prologue

"Marceline." A deep voice called out to me.

"No." I groaned into the smoky darkness around me.

"Marceline." The voice repeated.

"No." I groaned again.

"Wake the fuck up mother fucker." The voice commanded and by force, I sat up.

"What do you want from me?" I shouted/asked.

The voice laughed and then said: "Remember me?"

"I killed you!" I shouted back. _I killed them? I thought to myself. I don't think I've ever killed anyone with that deep a voice._

"Thought I was dead, didn't you?" The voice said mockingly.

"WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME?" I screamed.

"I'm alive!" The voice responded then laughed again. "Get up." The voice commanded very seriously once it had calmed down from its laughing fit.

"No." I groaned again.

"Get up." The voice commanded again. "Get up and look in the mirror, it's just a reflection."

"I DON'T WANT TO!" I screamed but my body forced me to get up and walk towards the mirror which had suddenly appeared out of the smoky abyss.

"Look in the mirror." The voice commanded once again, ignoring my screams of protest. "Look in the mirror. You're NOTHING. You're NOTHING without me." That voice put a lot of emphasis on the word "nothing". "Look in the motherfucking mirror!" It demanded again when I tried to look away. Then it began laughing again.

This entire time I was screaming one sentence over and over again. "LEAVE ME ALONE!"

At that point I had fallen out of bed and woke up. I looked around my room. Still dark. Still quiet. Still empty. Thank god. I looked at the clock. One-twenty-three in the morning. I only got twenty-six minutes of sleep. Great. Now I get to lie awake in my bed for two hours and wait to get twenty or thirty more minutes of sleep before I wake up from another nightmare.

_Someone, please kill me now._


	2. Part I: The Lock

"All kids hold an egg in their souls… The egg of our hearts… Our would-be selves, yet unseen…"

-Unknown


	3. The Second Heir

**Ya'll are gonna fuckin' hate me before this is over.**

**Song for this Chapter: "Kill You" by Eminem**

* * *

In the year of two-thousand thirty eight, it seemed very rare to find any semblance of hope in the world. Every day the world seemed a little bit darker. Every day people marched from their homes to their jobs and back to their homes in a way that seemed almost second-nature to them. As if they were programed from birth to follow this same daily pattern. It's very sad. Mostly because deep inside, everyone knows this is not the path they initially wanted to follow.

As children, all of these people had dreams. Dreams that they wanted to achieve more than anything, however, due to either circumstance or societal pressure or another unspecified third cause, they all gave up their dreams to follow this daily monotonous path.

A girl, young in years but not in intellect often watched these people from the roof of a high-rise building, staring at them with a gaze of both pity and envy; pity over the fact that they had been so weak that they had given up their dreams, envious because they even had dreams to give up in the first place.

Her large sapphire eyes studied each and every one of the ants below her. She was up so high that she couldn't see the details of their face or tell whether the particular ant she was staring at was male or female, but she knew very well that each of them would have lines of stress carved into their faces and a permanent look of exhaustion unwillingly plastered on their faces. She wondered what kind of dreams these people had; what kind of person they wanted to be before they gave it all up to become hard-working middle class drones.

She sighed. There was no point in it now. These people had chosen the path they had wanted to take in life and she had done the same. They had chosen to throw away their dreams in exchange for an easily deplorable life of mediocrity that only promised dissatisfaction and nothingness at the end of the finish line, while she had chosen never to even think of aspiring to anything better and leading a life full of sin and regret.

_This world is hopeless._ She thought to herself. _If people keep giving up on their dreams like this, then corruption and greed will take over this planet and there will be no positive future for anyone._

As she exited the roof, she couldn't help but think, _maybe it already has_.

* * *

She walked the incredibly long path home. Toride is about an hour's train ride from Tokyo. This was the town in which she lived. She was born in this town, but she wasn't exactly "raised" there even though she had lived there pretty much nearly her entire life.

She was walking up the main road in order to go to a friend's house to see if she could crash there for a few hours, seeing as trying to sleep on the roof of that building wasn't exactly working out for her. Something about being up so high made her made her kind of soul-searchy. Plus, the bright lights from the city below didn't help anything. She'd go home and sleep in her own bed, but given the fight she had with her mother the night before, she didn't think she'd be able to peacefully walk up to her room and go to bed.

As she walked down the street and passed an alleyway, she heard someone say "Hey you". She thought for a second that it was someone talking to her and turned around to see who it was, but she didn't see anyone.

"Your allowance was in there yesterday, wasn't it?" She quickly looked down the alley way to see to middle school aged kids harassing some kid who at the most had to have been a third-grader. She sighed as she pulled out her phone to call the police. The Japanese Police might be dumb enough to let hardened criminals like her run around freely, but they were just smart enough to handle a case of a kid getting his money jacked by a pair of teenaged punks.

"But… But I…" She heard the primary school aged child stammer as she dialed the numbers one-one.

Just as she was about to dial the zero, she heard someone say "I can't let that pass". She looked up to see a girl with pink hair and golden eyes. Her school uniform, which consisted of a red plaid skirt, white dress shirt, a red tie, and a black coat, was customized with various punk accessories. She looked tough, but the older girl watching from the alleyway's entrance knew automatically that this girl wasn't that much older than the boy the two punks were picking on. In fact, this girl wasn't that much younger than herself. The sapphire-eyed girl knew things were about to get ugly and pressed the zero on her phone's keypad.

"Huh? Who is this girl?" She heard one of the punks say as she pressed her extremely old cell phone to her ear.

"W-wait a second, that's…" The second punk started stammering in shock and fear, causing the sapphire-eyed girl to lower her cell phone from her ear to the earpiece speaker being pressed against her pale neck. "Hinamori Amu from Seiyo Elementary?"

Just as the girl with faux black hair began to wonder what the big deal was, the second punk went on to explain.

"She's rumored to have beaten Sakura Elementary's Soccer team soccer team by herself and I heard that at her old school, she got the students and teachers to do anything she wanted them to do! Even the Principal was afraid of her!"

The girl with dark hair and sapphire eyes couldn't help but internally laugh at this.

_Oh, kids… What other crazy shit will they come up with next? I mean, come on. Seriously? What does this girl have? Geass? There's no way any of that's true. _

"That's the spicy student from Seiyo Elementary that I've heard about!" The kid who was previously in the middle of getting his allowance jacked suddenly shouted in a fanboyish tone. "Hinamori Amu!"

"…So what?" Was all the pink haired girl said in response, still keeping her cool, tough girl look that did little to impress the girl with dyed black hair who was looking on at the whole scene.

Apparently, the two teenaged punks must have thought she said "I'm gonna take a katana, use it to rip out your heart, and give it as an offering to my lord, Satan" because they ran like a nuclear missile was about to come crashing down in that very spot with shouts of "We're sorry" and "We'll never do it again".

As soon as the pathetic punks were gone, the young boy pulled out a piece of paper, thanked the older girl and asked her for her autograph. Meanwhile, an elderly woman seemingly appeared out of nowhere and commented on what an admirable young woman Amu was. Amu looked nervous for a second, but quickly put back up her cool and tough exterior.

"…Are you an idiot?" Amu said. "It was just an annoyance as I was walking to school… Be careful from now on."

As Amu walked off, both the old woman and the young boy was taken aback by how "cool" she was. Amu didn't notice the presence of the dark-haired onlooker as she passed. The onlooker couldn't help but laugh at the whole situation. Just the thought of two thirteen-year-old boys running scared of a girl who had to at least be ten years old would make anyone snort a little bit. However, she was more laughing at how Amu had been acting like tough shit even though if they actually had challenged her to a skin-on-skin fight she probably would have lost and Amu probably knew that herself. The onlooker didn't know why she found that funny, she just did.

Her laughter immediately ceased when she had remembered that she had dialed the emergency number for the police and didn't say anything on the phone.

* * *

**If this lasts ten chapters, I'm gonna post this on . (With the lyrics removed, of course.) Just know that nothing too drastic will happen to change the events of the regular ****_Shugo Chara! _****Series and if you haven't watched the series or read the manga in a while it might be a good idea to do that while reading this fic.**

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**This was originally uploaded to the Hi no Nami Blogspot on 12/10/13.**


	4. The Heart's Egg

**I sometimes think I should try crystal meth, but then I think "nah, probably shouldn't".**

**Song for This Chapter: "Sing for the Moment" by Eminem **

* * *

"Marceline!" I heard her shout as I ascended the stairs.

"Oh, shut the fuck up you bitch!" I shouted in response.

"Don't use that kind of language with me!" She shouted back.

"Oh, shut the fuck up already!" I shouted back. "You don't give two fucks about me so I can do and say whatever the fuck I want!"

"No, it doesn't!" She shouted. As I reached the top of the stairs and looked back I could see tears streaming down her face. "I'm your mother!"

_And a shitty one at that._ I thought to myself.

"Like I give a fuck!" I shouted back as I angrily marched to my room and flung open the door.

"Tsukiyomi Marceline!" My mother shouted.

"Go to hell, bitch!" I shouted as I slammed the door shut. I immediately locked it and pushed the dresser in front of it to keep that bitch from coming in here.

_Stupid whore. Thinks she knows everything about me when she doesn't know shit. If I want to go out with my friends, I will. If I want to not come home for days on end, I will. I'm eleven years old. She doesn't have complete control over me anymore._

I sighed. She had started banging on the door and calling my name so I turned on the stereo and turned it all the way up to block her out. It was playing "Sing for the Moment" by Eminem. The perfect song for the mood I was in.

"Jesus Christ, that bitch is psycho." I muttered to myself. "Wish I could run away."

I sighed again. _No way that's ever going to happen. I'm gonna have to live every day of the next seven years of my life fucking going at it with this bitch. I wish I could kill her, but there'd be no point to it. I'd still be suffering every single day of my life._

I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, and tried to calm myself down.

_You know what I just need to get away from this shit._

I sighed, grabbed my backpack and my coat from the desk chair, and jumped out my broken window.

* * *

It took twelve knocks for anyone to answer. I was about to pick up the hatchet that was on the ground and break in. Although it was around eleven or twelve at night, I knew people were there because the lights were on and the music was blasting loud enough to wake up someone in Vietnam. (Probably did, too.) Needless to say, by the time Ichirou opened the door I was back to being pissed.

"What the fucking hell?!" I shouted when he finally came to the door. "I've been out there for twenty fucking minutes! You're lucky I didn't break open your fucking window!"

"Sorry…" Ichirou lazily muttered as he ran his fingers through his short, curly blonde hair. "We've been' doin' some stuff… Music…" I could tell by the fact that his eyes were bloodshot and he couldn't form a complete sentence that he was higher than the fucking International Space Station and just decided to drop it.

"Whatever just give me a beer." I said.

"Sure…" He said walking out of the doorframe. I followed him inside.

"...Only light beer… Want that?" He asked opening up his refrigerator.

"Better than nothin'." I said. Ichirou grabbed a can out of the fridge and threw it to me. "Thanks." I said as I caught it. "Hey, is everyone else downstairs?"

"Yeah…" He said.

"Have they been doing the same stuff you have?" I wanted to make sure they weren't all like that. If they were, I'd just leave. I don't like dealing with a bunch of people who are all high like that.

"Nah… Just drinkin'…" He said.

"Uh, dude, are you okay?" Something told me he might've done more than just cannabis.

"Yeah… Just gonna lie down…" He said as he turned towards one of the bedrooms off to the side of the house. That was the last time he was seen alive. We assume he died at some point during the night. His body is still in that bedroom. Everyone is afraid of going in there and taking care of it. If anyone asks about the smell, we just tell them that a raccoon died under the house. However, at the time I didn't know any of that and assumed the guy just needed a nap to sober up a bit, so I just shrugged and went downstairs. I still kind of feel guilty about that.

The basement in this house is weird. Actually, in Japan, just having a basement in your house is weird. Most houses only have two floors, a ground-level floor and an upstairs. There aren't many houses with basements that I've seen. This house is different, though. Not only does it have a basement, but I don't think it was originally intended to be a basement. I think it was originally intended to be a bomb shelter, mostly because the entrance to it is a hidden trap door in the master bedroom closet and you have to go down a really long ladder to get down there. (This is pretty inconvenient to us because we're usually drunk and high by the time we leave the place and can't even walk in a straight line, let alone climb a ladder without getting two or three steps up and then falling down.) Given the fact that it takes a while to get up and down the ladder, I would say that it's pretty deep underground. Plus, given the fact that the metal coating the walls has a silvery appearance and tarnishes easily, I would have to say that it's lead that's covering them. (Yes, I have expressed to everyone who usually hangs out down there that it is likely lead on the walls and they could fall victim to lead poisoning. Apparently, they don't care and to be very frank, I don't either.) Lead is very dense and is able to stop radiation. It would make sense for someone to coat an entire room with it if they were trying to build a bomb shelter. My guess is, it was either built during World War II, or built sometime after World War II by a paranoid previous owner.

The only thing I really question about the basement is how the current owner, Kai Nashi, got two couches, a pair of arm chairs, a stereo, and a coffee table down there. I mean, the only entrance is that small trap door and it's kind of a long drop to the bottom. I doubt that most of that stuff would be able to fit through the trap door, let alone survive the long drop to the bottom if in the likely event of whoever was moving that stuff down there were to drop it. I've been over it nine different ways and I just can't figure out how that would be possible. The only conclusion that I've come to is that I just have to accept that it's like the mystery of how Gibbs got the boat out of his basement on _NCIS_. There's no logical way for the boat to get out of there, but Gibbs somehow found a way to get the boat out of there and we all just have to accept that we will never know.

"What's up bitches?" I said as I reached the bottom of the ladder (somehow amazingly without falling on my ass).

"Hey Shady." They all said unenthusiastically.

"Ya'll don't sound too happy to see me." I observed. "What's up?"

"Well, I'm just bummed because I have to take my grandmother shopping at the mall tomorrow." My friend Sarah Vamparah said as pulled a stray blonde hair back behind her ear.

"What's so bad about that?" I asked.

"She still thinks it's nineteen-fifty-two." Sarah explained. "I can already picture how this is gonna go. 'No, grandma, we don't use those words anymore. That boy is allowed to drink from the fountain.'"

"Oh." I said. "Sorry about that. Wait, what is she doing in Japan if she's racist?"

"My dad brought her here." She explained. "He's gonna 'take care of her' and he wants me to give her one last fun day before that."

"I'm guessing 'take care of her' doesn't mean he's gonna put her in a home, right?" I asked.

"No, it does not." She clarified.

"Don't worry, my lips are sealed." I assured. "Why is everyone else bummed out?"

"There isn't anything to do." Fukui Akiko said as she leaned backwards on the arm of the couch she was sitting on, collapsing onto the couch backwards. "I'm bored."

"Same here." Yukimura Chouko, Akiko's friend, said in a bored tone as she flipped through a magazine. "We wouldn't be this bored if the guys just took us out dancing like we asked them to two hours ago."

"Hey! I ain't payin' twenty thousand yen just so my girlfriend can get her ass felt up by other guys!" Kimura Michi, Chouko's boyfriend, shouted.

"Go to hell!" Chouko shouted in retaliation.

"SHUT UP YOU STUPID BITCH!" He said as he was about to lunge for his girlfriend. I immediately got between them as I didn't want to have to go through another murder trial.

"HEY!" I shouted. "IF YOU DON'T CHILL OUT RIGHT NOW KIMURA, I WILL SHOOT YOU!" That caused Kimura to immediately stop in his tracks. He knows when I threaten to shoot someone, I mean it. That was what the last murder trial was about. He went back to his seat, still looking kind of pissed, but was willing to put that aside for now.

"Alright." I said as I took a deep breath to calm myself down. "Now look, if I've learned anything in the past seventeen years of my life, it's that if you're bored, you just go out and make your own fun."

"And how are we supposed to do that?" Akiko asked.

I think everyone noticed the devilish smile that crossed my face.

* * *

"Shady, is this legal?" Akiko asked.

"I've never heard of anyone being arrested for it, so it's probably fine." I said.

"That's because it's a fucking retarded idea." Kimura said.

"Shut up, Kimura." I said.

"I mean, this is dangerous." Kimura pointed out. "People could die."

"Like I care, Kimura." I said.

"We could all go to jail." Kimura once again stated the obvious.

"Look," I said looking him straight in his grey eyes. "if you want out, leave. Don't let any of the rest of us get arrested before we even get to have our fun."

"Fine." He said as he marched off. "Fuck you all."

"Why do we hang out with him?" I asked Sarah as we continued on to our destination.

"I don't know." Sarah said.

* * *

"The next showing of _The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug _will begin in five minutes." The feminine voice on the intercom at the movie theater said.

"This is gonna be so much fun!" Akiko said as her red eyes filled with excitement.

"You have the matches, right Chouko?" I asked.

"In my purse." She said patting the bag.

"Good." I said.

"I hope they aren't doing bag checks." Sarah said. "If they are, that would really ruin what we have planned."

"Don't worry, they aren't gonna do bag checks." I assured. "They're too dumb to learn from others mistakes. Well, actually in this case, it wouldn't be learning from anyone's mistakes 'cause the Aurora guy didn't sneak his guns into the theater, he waited 'till the movie was halfway through then snuck out through the emergency exit and got the gun from his car, but that's beside the point."

"But this is a pretty big movie premiere." Sarah pointed out. "They might just be a little more cautious than usual."

"You think this is a big movie premiere?" I asked in disbelief.

"Well, yeah." Sarah said. "I mean, I've never been a fan of this _Lord of the Rings _crap but I do know a lot of people happen to like it."

"Yeah, but I doubt very many people would want to sit through what is essentially a three-hour long episode of _Game of Thrones_." I said.

"Wait, is that what this movie is about?" Chouko asked.

"Basically." I said.

"Then why are we going into this movie when we can just go to my place and watch the DVD I have of the first season of _Game of Thrones_ for free?" Akiko asked.

"Look, it was the first movie that was showing." I said agitatedly. "Unless you wanna go watch _American Hustle _or whatever other shit they're showing here and miss our show, you are going to sit down and watch the first thirty minutes of this _Game of Thrones _rip-off. Got it?"

"Got it." She said dejectedly as she ran her fingers from her short pink tresses down to her black extensions while her dyed-purple bangs covered her eyes.

"Oh good." Sarah said as we approached the usher's stand. "They aren't doing bag checks."

"Thank god." Chouko said as she pushed her blonde bangs, which had streaks of turquois in them, to the right side of her face.

"Told you so." I muttered melodically under my breath. Sarah must've heard it, though because she gave me kind of a pissed off glare.

* * *

Once we took our seats in the theater, we had to sit through those stupid movie trivia cards, behind the scenes looks at the new season of _Pretty Little Liars_, some movie about stealing art back from the Nazis, and some other movie called _Transcendence_, commercials for everything from Coca-Cola to promoting the Victory Tour for this year's _Hunger Games,_ (I don't think anyone in Japan knows that children actually die in that.) and trailers for _Polar Bears, Divergent, _and _Her_ before the actual movie started. You know, they really should tell people to go into the theaters five minutes before the actual movie starts so that way they don't have to suffer through nearly an hour of crap. All that does is make a movie that's already longer than it needs to be even longer.

Once the movie was about thirty minutes through, I decided that the other movie goers had let down their guards enough to be taken by serious surprise by my plan. I was sitting in the aisle seat. Sarah sat to the left of me with her bag open. To the left of her was Chouko, who had the matches. Akiko sat to the left of Chouko in the seat closest to the wall. I reached into Sarah's purse and took out the key to my plan, M-80 Firecrackers. (Do not ask me how I got them.) I motioned to Chouko to give me the matches.

"Hey, Shady," Akiko said wearily as she noticed Chouko pulling the matches out of her jacket pocket. "are you sure this is okay?"

"Oh, it's not okay." I said as I reached over and took the matches from Chouko. "It's illegal."

"Illegal!" Akiko said a little too loud for my liking. Both Sarah and Chouko shushed her. "What do you mean it's illegal?" Akiko said this time in a more quiet tone.

"It's illegal to set off explosives indoors anywhere in Japan." I explained. "Anywhere in the world, really. You'd have to be a real idiot not to know that." I tried striking a match, but it wouldn't light.

"Th-Then why are you doing it?" Akiko asked, sounding a bit fearful as she did so.

I tried striking the same match again, but once again, it wouldn't light.

"Because it'll cause a panic and panic is fun." I simply said. I tried striking the same match a third time, but with no luck. "Is this one a dud?" I muttered to myself.

"Plus it'll cause a pretty cool light show." Sarah added. "You know, that is until the fire gets pretty bad and we all have to get the fuck out of here."

"Crap." I muttered. The fourth strike confirmed my suspicions. I threw the dud match on the ground and pulled another match out of the book.

"Aren't you guys worried about consequences and shit?" Akiko asked fearfully.

"I'm above the law." I said as I struck the match. No luck.

"My family's got a very good lawyer." Sarah said. "If worse comes to worst he can just throw together an Affluenza defense and I'll get off with only ten years of probation."

"My step-father raped me and my mother tried to set me on fire." Chouko said. "I think prison is a safer environment for me than home."

"Ah-ha!" I quietly cheered. I had finally gotten the match to ignite. "Yes, now to just-" My celebration was cut short by a flashlight being shined in my face.

"We got reports of suspicious activity going on in this row." The usher said in a scarily strict voice. "Would you four please come with me to the manager's office."

_Oh shit._ I thought to myself.

* * *

"So let me get this straight," The manager said. "the four of you tried to set off M-80 firecrackers in a movie theater."

"That is correct, sir." I said in the calmest and non-defiant manner I possibly could.

"Do you know how stupid that is?" He was clearly irate. "You could have started a fire! This whole building could have burned down! Someone could have gotten hurt! You yourselves could have gotten hurt! What could have possibly possessed you to do something like this?"

"Easy." I said. "The same thing that causes people to do everything else that they do in their lives: boredom."

"Boredom is not an excuse for your actions." The manager continued on his angry rant. "Do you know how seriously people take these kinds of crimes, especially after what happened in the United States? You'll be lucky if the police don't arrest you for terrorism. Now, what do you have to say for yourselves?"

"I'm above the law." I said again.

"I have Affluenza." Sarah said.

"I'm safer in Jail." Chouko said.

"PLEASE DON'T SEND ME TO PRISON!" Akiko cried.

Obviously the manager didn't like what we said in our defense and looked like he was about to blow a gasket. However, lucky for us, Sarah got an idea. She took of the royal blue sweater she had to wear for school, undid her dark blue tie, and undid a few buttons of her white button-up shirt. She tousled her hair a bit, before crossing her legs and put her finger to her lips while she did sort of a pout.

"Kanrisha-san," Sarah said in the cutest, most innocent voice she could do. "we're really sorry we did this. Do you think you could just let us off with a warning, seeing as this is the first time we've done something as serious as this?"

You would not believe the flood of blood that came out of that man's nose.

* * *

Sarah's trick worked. The police weren't called and we were free to go. I tried to talk everyone else into trying this someplace else, but they all had agreed that the last time was a close enough call. Eventually, everyone went their separate ways to their own homes, leaving me alone to wander the dark streets with boredom and depression overtaking me.

* * *

**Okay, so here is chapter two. This one was easier to write than chapter one. Mostly because I did chapter one in a POV that I'm not used to writing in. In fact, I wrote chapter one in that POV by accident. I forgot that I already wrote the Prologue in Marceline's POV and I guess at some point I decided to do something different. Yes, I know the first chapter was bad, but I'm not changing it because, one, I'm lazy, and two, every chapter is bad. Not just that one. **

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**This was originally uploaded to the Hi no Nami Blogspot on 12/26/13**


	5. In Your Eyes

**I regret ninety-eight percent of the comments and reviews I make on You Tube, DeviantART, and FanFiction.**

**"Amityville" by Eminem Featuring Bizarre **

* * *

The office had green walls and a red carpet. Although there was a chandelier, two floor lamps, and a desk lamp, the room was dimly lit because it was so big. Along one wall there was nothing but bookshelf after bookshelf filled with nothing but legal tomes, books on business ethics, and huge binders with client information. There was a small sitting area near the door, complete with leather couches and a television, which was turned off. A stereo, which was placed just behind one of the couches, was playing the song "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes" by the Platters at a low volume.

In the center of the room a man at approximately sixty-five years of age sat at his desk contemplating what to do next. His name was Jacob Thompson. He was a graduate of one of America's most prestigious law schools who came to Japan to work as a lawyer for one of the most powerful companies in the world, Easter Incorporated. For nearly forty years he handled the legal side of Easter's international affairs. He found ways around many laws and was pretty much the man who gave Easter the ability to do whatever they wanted in whatever country they wanted to do it in.

However, recently he discovered the consequences of his actions while on a trip with his wife to Indonesia. While talking to someone at a restaurant, he mentioned that he worked for the Easter Corporation in Japan. This comment was overheard by several locals and he was attacked. They called him every foul name in the book; "Bastard", "Fascist", "Slave Master" and worst of all, "Murderer".

It turned out that Easter had built a very large, unsafe factory in Indonesia. They employed thousands of people-including children-to work long hours in a hot, decrepit building making tennis shoes and cheap electronics. Mr. Thompson was horrified by the discovery of that fact, but was more horrified when he returned to Japan and started doing some research. It had turned out that by finding ways around the laws in various countries he had destroyed the lives of thousands, if not millions of people.

He confronted Easter's Director, Hoshina Kazuomi about this. Kazuomi told him that if he went to the media or the police, they would be forced to "take care" of him. Obviously, Mr. Thompson didn't listen to him and had a conference call with _the Tokyo Daily News_, _the New York Times_, and _the Wall Street Journal _scheduled for later that evening. Easter wasn't going to have any of that, which is why they were making me handle it.

I was standing on the roof of Mr. Thompson's office building, looking down into the room through a skylight. My long, dark hair was tied back in a long braid down my back and I was wearing the uniform that Easter made me wear when I was working, which was a black, short-sleeved button-up shirt with a cyan tie around my neck. The shirt was made out of a special material that was thinner, yet stronger than most materials used in things such as bullet-proof vests. I had black shorts on underneath a cyan colored skirt which was made out of a material that stretched, making running in a skirt less difficult. The stockings I was wearing went up to my lower thighs and were made out of the same material as the shirt. The shoes I was wearing were specially designed to have better traction than a truck tire and had a secret weapon installed in the toe. I also had on cyan gloves that did nothing more than keep my fingerprints from getting on shit.

I was waiting for the perfect opportunity to strike, which would be when Mr. Thompson got up from his desk. The skylight was directly over his desk. If I were to go jumping through the window right then and there, not only would he be taken by surprise and likely scream for help before I could stop him, but he'd also have ample opportunity to fight back. I know, you're probably saying "He's sixty-five years old! He's not gonna fight back, and if he does, you're an able-bodied eleven-year-old girl! He should be easy to take down!" but let me tell you, the elderly still have some vigor left in them. I learned that the hard way. Also, I'm not an able-bodied eleven-year-old. I'm short and underweight.

Before coming up with this plan, I did consider the possibility of shooting him with one of my arrows through the skylight, but decided against it because I figured that the skylight wouldn't open wide enough for me to get an arrow to hit where I wanted it to go. I'd break the glass, but anyone with half a brain could figure out why that wouldn't work.

So, I was left with this plan: Wait for him to get up from his desk, slip through the open skylight (I'm fairly certain I can fit.), land on his desk, catch him off guard and shoot him in the eye. Probably not the best plan ever. I can name a hundred different things that could go wrong with that, but it's all I can come up with on the spot.

All of a sudden there was a knock at Mr. Thompson's door.

_Crap_. I thought. _I didn't take someone suddenly showing up into account. I might have to rethink my plan._

"Come in." Mr. Thompson said exasperatedly. A woman, most likely a secretary entered the room.

"Sorry for the intrusion, Thompson-san," The woman said politely. "but someone from the Osaka branch is on the li-"

"Tell them to call back later." He said cutting her off. "In fact, tell that to anyone who calls that isn't that conference call I have scheduled, my wife or my son."

"Are you sure?" She asked.

"Yes, I'm sure." He said.

"Is there anything else you want me to do?" She asked.

"No, that will be all." He said. After that, she nodded and left the room.

Mr. Thompson then leaned over his desk and pressed his hand to his forehead in exasperation. He looked over at a photo on his desk, probably one of his wife or his son, then turned and got up to look out the window behind him. Now is the perfect time to strike.

With my bow in one hand and an arrow in the other, I squeezed through the skylight and landed on his desk with a loud thud. Obviously hearing my landing, Mr. Thompson turned around to see me standing on his desk with an arrow ready to fly. By the time he started to move towards the door and get help, that arrow was lodged in his shoulder. He cried out and started to bolt for the door, so I had no choice but to shoot him in the leg.

The final blow was a shot to the eye. Once I was sure he was dead, I took pictures on my cell phone to show the Director, and left out the window. Once I was safely on the ground, I threw up and started crying.

* * *

I stood quietly by the door as he shuffled through the pictures on my phone.

"And you're sure he's dead?" Director Hoshina said.

"Yes, sir." I said quietly. "Positive."

He continued to stare at the phone, shuffling through the photos with an unreadable expression.

"Good work." He said without meaning it, handing me back my cell phone.

"Thank you." I said as I walked forward to take the phone back. Once the phone was out of his hands, he turned is office chair around so it was facing the giant glass wall behind his desk that faced the Tokyo Skyline. "Um, sir," I said nervously. "about my offer…"

"I'll consider it." He said harshly.

"Okay, thank you." I said quietly as I turned to leave.

* * *

"Marceline." I knew what this deep voice was and tried to ignore it. "Marceline." It said more intensely. "I know you're awake, Marceline."

_Crap_. I knew that this wasn't going to be good.

"Come on now, open your eyes." The deep voice said and suddenly my eyes were forced open, forcing me to stare into the smoky darkness.

"WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME!?" I shouted.

"I just want you to see something, Marceline." The deep voice said with a laugh.

"See something?" I questioned.

"Get up." The voice commanded.

"No."

"Get up!" The voice commanded again.

"NO!" I screamed. "NO! I DON'T WANT TO!"

"Get up and see what I want you to see!" The now enraged voice commanded. I was then forced to stand up and walk towards a slumped over silhouette on the other side of the darkness. When I reached it, I saw that it was the grotesque, bloody body of Mr. Thompson. I tried as hard as I could not to scream.

"You see this?" The voice asked. "You did this, Marceline. You are the reason this man is dead."

"NO!" I screamed. "STOP IT! STOP IT!"

"Why should I stop? You murderer!" At the word "murderer" I broke down screaming and crying. The voice must have realized I didn't like being called that and began chanting the word over and over again, no matter how much I screamed, cried, and begged for it to stop. After going through what felt like decades of torture, I woke up in my room with a tear-soaked face, and still a murderer.

* * *

**Okay, I understand if you hate this fic and are gonna stop reading now. I'm pretty sure I didn't handle this realistically enough. *sigh* Well, Happy New Year! ('Cause this was originally posted on the Hi no Nami blogspot on New Year's Day.) I hope twenty-fourteen is better than last year. (Probably won't be because most of my friends are seniors and are graduating in May.) T-T**

* * *

**This was originally uploaded to the Hi no Nami Blogspot on 1/1/14**


	6. Joker

**My mom did not find a video where someone ate a frog funny. How are we related?**

**"Joker" by Turn a Studio Featuring Hatsune Miku**

* * *

A disheveled looking Stan Smith walked into a bathroom as the voice-over started talking.

"Do you sometimes feel irritable, restless, uneasy, sad, normal or just plain not high?" The voice-over asked. Stan was rubbing the back of his head and was looking around as the voice-over said this. "Maybe it's time to try Crack." The voice-over continued. Stan then walked into the shower and pulled the curtain closed. Then the letters C-R-A-C-K were spray painted on the screen. Underneath them the word "Methybenzoylecgonine" appeared under the letters. After a few seconds, the letters and the word disappeared and Stan stepped out of the shower to be greeted by a random golden retriever and the background suddenly changed from the bathroom to a grassy field where Stan began playing fetch with the dog. Then there was a montage of clips typical of a drug ad showing Stan boating with some old woman, having a little girl dance on his feet at either a wedding or an anniversary party, and the same golden retriever jumping into a pool and Stan jumping in after him. As that montage of clips played, the voice-over continued. "Crack may cause shivers, night terrors, 'gay for pay', heart palpitations, homicidal paranoia, or the sensation that you are on fire. Peeing blood and seeing friends' faces as talking skeletons are possible side-effects of Crack. People who use Crack may also experience five to seven years in prison where brutal raping may occur. If you experience one or more of these side effects, consult your dealer, you may need more crack." The commercial finished with Stan petting the dog, back in the grassy field, and the dog jumping on him and licking him. The voice-over finished with the slogan: "Crack: Isn't it time you see what all the fuss is about?"

I just sat there staring blankly at the television, but internally I was trying to figure out what that was about. I know that clip was from _American Dad!_ because I watch it a lot, but I wasn't watching _American Dad!._ I was watching _Channel Five News at Noon_. You'd think it was an ad for the show then, but this channel doesn't air _American Dad!_. Plus, if it was an ad, they'd probably put the show's logo at the end and either the channel and time it airs or when it's going to be available on DVD, but they didn't. Plus, they also cut out the part at the end of the scene where the dog was revealed to actually be some homeless person. So, considering all these factors, it must have been edited to be either an ad encouraging people to use crack or discouraging them from doing so. I'd like to think it's discouraging, but something deep down in my gut says different.

Just as the news was coming back on, I heard one of the upstairs doors open and close and someone walk downstairs. I was expecting it to be my mother and was bracing myself for another scream match which would inevitably end with me marching out the door in a rage, but instead it was my brother who shouldn't be home at all. He's supposed to be in school, but I guess he decided to skip again today. He does this often. He either sleeps through the alarm, or he leaves the house dressed in his school uniform and says he's going to school, but really doesn't. I know this because often times Sarah and I will walk to a Convini, or Dunkin' Donuts, or to our friend Antonio's house and either I'll see him and say nothing, or Sarah will see him and say "Hey, isn't that your brother?".

"What are you watching?" Ikuto asked as he sat down next to me. (Or rather should I say that he collapsed onto the couch in the way that all guys do. That's one weird thing that I've noticed. Girls sit down on chairs, guys collapse into them. It's weird.)

"_News at Noon_." I replied.

"Oh". He said. I looked over and stared at him. "What?" He said when he finally noticed.

"Shouldn't you be in school?" I asked.

"Shouldn't you?" He turned my own question on me.

Technically, yes, I should be in school too, but no school in the entire Kanto Region will let me attend classes. This is mostly because when I was about to start Kindergarten my parents tried to get me into Seiyo Academy. Before they let anyone in their school they do psychological exams on the potential students (Even four-year-olds.) because they don't want another shooting to happen. I failed these psychological exams and was not allowed to attend their school. Now, normally I'd still get into any public school despite failing a psychological exam, but Seiyo Academy has the best K-Six program in the country and the second-best Seven-Twelve program. They know what they're doing. When they refuse to let someone in 'cause they're crazy, it kind of stands out. Plus when you add in the fact that I got kicked out of public school for killing a girl with a brick, they kind of generally take the welfare of their other students into account. (Just so you know I didn't mean to kill the girl. She was kicking the shit out of me and I probably would have been beaten to death if I didn't do something. I only hit her once and she fell to the ground and I immediately ran crying to the nearest teacher. Also, she didn't die right away. She was in a persistent vegetative state for three years before the plug was finally pulled.) Oh, well. I guess being evil does have its perks. I know this one guy got out of college for nearly five months because he was suspected of being a mass murderer. It later turned out that he did do it but he's not in jail and he's not dead, which sucks.

After that the conversation pretty much died and we just listened to the reporter describe a triple-rape/homicide in horrific detail before sending us back to the news anchors who were talking pleasantly about the weather. I looked away in disgust.

_How can people talk so pleasantly about the weather after having broadcast something like that?_ I thought to myself. I glanced at Ikuto. He didn't seem to be paying attention to what they were saying on the TV at all. In fact, although he wasn't outwardly showing it, I had a hunch something was bothering him. Don't ask me how I knew. It's one of those weird sibling things. I pick up on it with Utau, too, and they both pick up on it with me. It's another weird thing I've noticed.

"What's wrong?" I asked although I knew how he'd respond.

"Nothing." Right on the money.

"Nothing, huh?" I said.

_If that's how you want to play, Tsukiyomi, so be it. _I thought as I moved so that way I was lying on my back. I moved my socked feet off the coffee table and stuck them right in his face. "So if nothing is wrong, why are my feet in your face?"

"Get your feet out of my face, Marceline." He said pushing my feet out of his face, but as soon as they were gone, they were back.

"Well, you said there's nothing wrong." I said. "There has to be something wrong if my feet are in your face."

"That doesn't make sense." Ikuto pointed out as he pushed them away again.

"It doesn't have to." I said.

"You know what? Fine." Ikuto said after I stuck my feet in his face for the eighth time. "You wanna stick your feet in my face, go right ahead. I don't care."

"You don't, huh?" I said with a smile on my face.

"Nope." He said.

"Okay then." I said. I let a long pause pass before I reviled what I was going to do next.

"_I hear your heart beat to the beat of the drums_" I began to sing.

"_Oh what a shame that you came here with someone_

_So while you're here in my arms_

_Let's make the most of the night like we're gonna die young_"

"Okay, I do not have to take this torture." Ikuto said as he got up from the couch and began walking towards the kitchen. I got up and followed him. Ikuto hates Ke$ha. I mean he absolutely **hates** her. He hates her more than he hates Miley Cyrus and Justin Bieber, which is saying something.

"_We're gonna die young_

_We're gonna die young_

_Let's make the most of the night like we're gonna die young_" I sang as I chased after him.

"You have horrible taste in music." Ikuto said as he reached the fridge.

"Hey, you're one to talk." I said. "You listen to Nightmare and Maximum the Hormone. Everyone knows they're like, so two-thousand seven."

"You like Maximum the Hormone." Ikuto pointed out as he opened the fridge.

"Just 'What's Up People', 'Zetsubo Billy', and 'Koi no Mega Lover'." I said. "All the rest of their songs suck.

"Oh." That didn't sound like a good "oh".

"What?" I asked.

"We're completely out of food." He said stepping out of the way so that way I could see that the fridge was, in fact, completely empty.

"What?" I said in disbelief. "How'd that happen? I just went shopping yesterday."

"The refrigerator went running?" He sarcastically suggested.

_Or our mother got the munchies_. I thought but didn't say.

"Well, this is just great." I muttered. Just then Ikuto's phone made the sound it makes when it gets a text. He glanced at it and his expression immediately soured.

"Well, it looks like I'm going out, anyways." He said. "I'll get the groceries on the way back."

"Okay." I said. "Hold on, I'll get money out of the emergency stash."

I went upstairs to my room and got the money out of its secret hiding place (You honestly think I'll tell you where?) then went downstairs and gave it to Ikuto.

"Get me some Cheetos!" I said as he left.

* * *

Ikuto didn't come back until eight o'clock at night and he came back empty handed.

"Where are the groceries?" I asked.

"What?" He said.

"The groceries?" I said, trying to jog his memories. "I gave you money to go and get them hours ago."

"Uh…"

_He forgot? _I thought. _That's so unlike him_.

"Well, can I have the money back?" I ask.

He stayed silent.

_Holy fuck, he didn't forget. He __**chose**__ to spend it on something stupid._

"Ikuto." I said.

"Yeah?"

"I'm going to hit you with a bat."

* * *

**Okay, so I showed my mom this video online where this girl ate a "frog". (Before you call PETA, she said in the comments that it wasn't a real frog she ate.) I thought it was hilarious, she thought it was stupid. What do you think? I'll send you a link to the video if you ask. **

**I came up with this chapter by watching ****_American Dad! _****and annoying family members.**

* * *

**This was originally uploaded to the Hi no Nami Blogspot on 1/6/14.**


	7. Geniuses are Born Geniuses

**Doesn't writer's block suck?**

**"Can't Hold Us" by Macklemore and Ryan Lewis Featuring Ray Dalton**

* * *

"It's with you!" An old, dried-up hag shouted on the television. I was hanging out with Sarah, Akiko, Kimura, Akiko's boyfriend Suzuki Hideyoshi, Oshiro Shizuka, and Minami Daisuke. We were eating breakfast for dinner from some restaurant down the street and watching some talk show about fortunetelling or something. I didn't know what was going on because up until she screamed that as loud as she possibly could, I wasn't paying attention.

"I guess a genius would have a Genius Guardian Spirit with them!" She said.

_Guardian Spirit?_ I thought. _What the hell is she talking about? Ah, forget it. It's just some crazy old loon who got a television show on Sakura TV. That's easier to do than selling your soul to Easte- I mean, Satan._

"Genius?" Her guest said. "I'm nothing like that."

"You definitely have a Genius Guardian Spirit with you." She insisted. "Geniuses are born with the ability to be geniuses! And compared to him… All of you are just ordinary. And though I hate to say it, your Guardian Spirits are just ordinary."

_Yup, this bitch is definitely off her rocker. I mean, what person tells someone that they're just ordinary? Humans like to be told their special and that the world just wouldn't be the same without them. …I like this bitch. _

"No matter how much a normal person might try, they'll never be a genius." She said bluntly.

"Come now, that's not…" The guest had started saying when Shizuka flipped the channel.

"Why are we watching this?" She asked as she flipped the channel to MTV. "It's crap."

"Oh, and a television show about attention whores from New Jersey is better?" I asked sarcastically.

"At least we're not watching some bitch talk down to people on national TV." Shizuka said as she crossed her arms over black dress with green straps and the two necklaces she wore. One of the necklaces had a diamond charm, the other had a puzzle piece. I also remember that she was wearing black bangles, and for some reason was wearing both a hairclip and a hairband in her blonde hair streaked with black and pink. "How did she even get a TV show?" She asked in disbelief.

"Well, it is Sakura TV." Sarah pointed out. Sarah was wearing her normal school uniform and her hair was tied up in a messy ponytail. "They're willing to put anything on just for ratings. Remember when they put on six hours of a chimp trying to resuscitate its dead mother?"

"Oh yeah, that was just terrible." Suzuki agreed. He had brown hair and green eyes and was wearing a green shirt and jeans and was in a relaxed position while multi-tasking with running his fingers through Akiko's multi-colored hair and eating some of his omelet. "I remember they came under a lot of fire for that."

"That's because it was so heartbreaking!" Akiko said as she put her Styrofoam box of pancakes down on the coffee table and pressed her hands up to her heart. "The poor baby!"

"Although, I guess that bitch did have a point." Sarah said as she swallowed the last bit of her French toast. "Not everyone can be a genius. It takes a lot of hard work and stuff to get your IQ up that high. Not everyone is willing to put in that kind of effort."

"Says the girl who's paying someone who has had basically no formal education do her homework for her." I pointed out.

"Well, that's different." She said.

"How?" I demanded.

"I'm rich and pretty." She simply stated. "I don't need to be smart."

And with that I sighed with exasperation.

* * *

**Yup. I got writer's block with this chapter and this was all I was able to come up with. You can all feel free to throw rocks at me and call me a quitter. I deserve it. This particular episode in the anime (Episode Five) isn't easy to work with because it's pure filler (The first pure filler episode out of at least forty or so. Need to count that later for future reference.), though and I just wanted to get this chapter out of the way so I wouldn't have to deal with it anymore. So don't throw those rocks too hard. **

**Well, it doesn't help that I've been out of school for the past week because I was hospitalized with Influenza. That was scary. My fever went up to a hundred-four (F) and wouldn't go down. After that I got pneumonia which in my opinion sucked worse than the flu.**

**Oh! And I finally, finally, finally, FINALLY, after a month of waiting got ****_Death Note: Another Note. _****I'm fairly certain most of you haven't heard of it 'cause most of you are somewhere between the ages of twelve and fourteen years old and mostly watch animes where there's a girl and two guys after her affections, but it is a really awesome book. It's a prequel to the anime/manga series ****_Death Note_****, which is a really amazing psychological thriller anime which I recommend to anyone and everyone who claims they like anime. If you wanna find out more about it, you can look it up on Wikipedia or watch the episodes on You Tube. If you like it, you definitely have to check out this book. It's really good! (P.S. I snuck a reference to ****_Death Note_**** in this chapter. It'll be obvious to those who know the series.)**

**Special shout out to whoever got me the Smarties Candy Canes! (I forget who.) I've already coated my trap pad with sticky stuff because I've been eating so many of them. **

* * *

**This was originally uploaded to the Hi no Nami Blogspot on 1/26/14**


	8. Amulet Spade

**Who is your daddy and what does he do?**

**"Blue Moon" by Nana Mizuki **

* * *

"Marceline."

"Go Away."

"Oh, come on. I just want to talk to you, Marceline."

"Leave me alone."

"I just want to talk to you."

"Well, I don't want to talk to you. Go away."

"Come on, talk to me, Marceline."

"I swear to God, if you don't go away now I'll-"

"You'll do what?"

"Never mind."

"What would you do, Marceline?"

"I said, never mind."

"You'll **kill** me, Marceline. Is that what you were going to say? You'll kill me."

"Leave me alone!"

"I should expect that from a killer."

"Stop calling me that! Leave me alone, please!"

"Why should I stop? I'm just saying what you are. You're a killer, Marceline."

"No!"

"You're a killer!"

"No!"

"A killer!"

"Leave me alone!"

"A killer!"

"Leave me alone!"

"A **killer**!"

"LEAVE ME ALONE!"

* * *

I woke up when my face collided with my bedroom floor. My face was covered in tears from the distressing dream. I rolled over, sat up, and used the sleeve of my pajama top to try and erase the saline water from my face. I gave up on that once I realized that my eyes would just produce more.

I sat on the floor for almost an hour crying into my knees and saying "I'm not a killer. I'm not a killer. It's Easter's fault. They made me do it. I'm not a killer." over and over again. I finally decided to get up and get something to drink.

When I went down stairs, I noticed the office door was shut and the light was on. I wondered what Director Hoshina wanted. He has two other apartments in Tokyo and hardly ever comes here. For a split second I considered finding out why, but then I decided against starting an altercation which would require police intervention at three in the morning. I didn't need to be on _White Trash and in Trouble_ again.

I got my drink and did feel a little better afterwards, but I still felt uneasy and didn't really want to go back to bed. I considered finishing that book I've been reading, but I felt way too high-strung to do that. What I really needed was to go outside and take a walk to clear my head.

* * *

Have you ever walked around or driven aimlessly without paying attention for so long that you have no fucking idea where you are anymore? Well, that's what happened to me. Seriously, I started walking at three in the morning and my legs finally gave out sometime around one in the afternoon and I had no idea where I was. My ability to space out amazes me sometimes. Well, I mean, I don't space out all the time, but when I do I usually get pretty fucking lost.

At least I didn't have to worry about getting jumped. This seemed to be a pretty nice shopping area. It had a Starbucks, so you know it's high-class. It also had some really fancy stores filled with clothing I could never hope to afford. Even if I could afford it, I probably wouldn't shop in these places anyways. I'm sort of a worn out jeans and t-shirt/sweatshirt type of person.

My first instinct told me to find a train station. I don't have a train card on me, but I'd be able to use the maps there to figure out where I was. I'd use the Google Maps App on my phone to look up where I was, but I don't have one of those stupid iPhones that everyone else has these days. I'm too poor to afford one.

I started down the cement walkway, looking for a sign or anything else that indicated where a train station was located. I couldn't believe how well rich people had it. Most of the places I shop at either are not legitimate businesses or had the words "good" and "will" somewhere in the name. Not only did these places obviously have a license to partake in commerce and actually have a lease on the building they were in, but they were clearly thriving. This place was crawling with young women, all of whom had at least one shopping bag in their hand, emblemized with the logo of some extravagant store. They all were dernier cri and were probably the least bit worried about getting jumped by some hood.

Well, that was until they saw me. I was out of place with my sneakers that were worn to the sole, non-purposefully tight fitting pants, old t-shirt, and sweatshirt that had been stolen from my brother's room. If I didn't scream **HOOD**, I don't know what did, although, I could have slightly nicer clothes if I wanted. I do have a substantial amount of money set aside specifically for buying clothes, but when it does come time to buy them I give all the money to Ikuto and Utau and let them buy whatever they want while I just used whatever was left over to buy myself a few shirts and pants. I don't mind. I'm usually too lazy to get all dressed up anyways and besides, I hate materialism.

I guess I was paying more attention to the street signs than where I was going, because after walking about a block I slammed into someone. I was about to apologize; until I saw who it was I slammed into and quickly took back any once of remorse I had.

"Why hello, Marci-chan." He said in a seductive voice.

"Fuck off, Huntzburger." I didn't want to take any of his bullshit today.

Logan Huntzburger, to put it simply, is a guy who gets paid by Easter to do basically nothing. He literally does nothing all day except fuck pretty blonde whores and watch porn on his computer. Sometimes he does both at the same time. He really does nothing that contributes to the company in any way whatsoever and gets paid millions a day. Meanwhile, I bust my ass off silencing whistle blowers and eliminating their competition and I don't get paid squat. Not even a small sum of money in exchange for keeping my mouth shut. It's so fucking unfair!

The thing that really pissed me off about Logan, though, was the fact that he always had to hit on me. Not only was it completely unwanted, but it was also kind of disturbing. Logan was born in two-thousand nine, which would make him twenty-nine years old. I was born in twenty-twenty-seven, making me eleven years old. You see the problem here?

As I stood there, angered and disgusted that I was currently standing within two-thousand meters of such a vile creature, I couldn't help but notice he was kind of checking me out. What is wrong with this guy? What the hell does he find attractive about me? I'm a pubescent child, yet I am still pretty much as flat as a board. How does anyone who isn't a trusted religious official find that attractive?

"So, Marci-koi," Logan purred as he got way to close for comfort. "what are you doing in such a nice place like this?" He put his arms around me and hurriedly tried to get out of his grip. "Buying some sexy lingerie for me to tear off you?" He started kissing my neck and I screamed. As soon as he heard me call out for help, he took his hand of my waist and covered my mouth. "What is wrong with you?" he hissed at me.

"WHAT IS WRONG WITH **ME**?" I screamed through his hand. "**YOU** ARE THE ONE **SEXUALLY HARRASSING **A YOUNG GIRL, YOU **PERVERT**!"

I quickly began looking for an opening; something that would allow me to escape this situation. My options were limited given that I only had one hand free, and most of my weight (As far as I could tell by the way it felt.) was on my legs, meaning if I did some kind of leg attack like kicking or kneeing him in the groin, I'd probably fall down. Given the position we were in, that would probably make things worse.

I decided to try slamming the heal of my one free hand into his nose, causing blood to come gushing out of it in big red globs and his hands to release me and move to the source of pain. As soon as he did that, I used it as an opportunity to knee him in the groin. He let out a yelp of agony as he fell to the ground.

"LEAVE ME ALONE YOU SICKO!" I shouted as I ran off in the opposite direction.

* * *

It only just occurred to me while looking back this event that I had just nearly gotten raped in broad daylight in a crowded place and no one stopped to help me, even when I was screaming.

Damn rich people.

* * *

**My daddy is you and you do mommy! LOL! XD**

**I took that from a You Tube video. If anyone wants I can send them the link. ;)**

**I'm actually pretty satisfied with this chapter. It may seem a little rushed, but it came out exactly the way I wanted it to and that makes me happy. :)**

**So today is February thirteenth, which means tomorrow is Valentines day. To be honest, this holiday is kind of "meh" for me. I mean, I don't hate it like some people on the internet do because they're "FOREVER ALONE" but for me it's just not enjoyable. Probably because I am currently not nor have I ever been in the past, ever been in a relationship. Mostly because I was born socially retarded. *Sigh*. **

**But, rather than complain about not being in a relationship, why don't these people who call themselves "FOREVER ALONE" just go do something to distract themselves from all the lovey-dovey shit. Like, I don't know, go out bowling with a bunch of other single friends, see a movie (I haven't seen it, yet, but ****_The Monuments Men_**** looks good.), or go down to the local shelter and pet all the little kitties and puppies that want nothing more than to be loved. I really do recommend that last one, especially if you are THAT depressed about not being in a relationship.**

**In other news, I finished ****_Death Note: Another Note_****. Can't say I was surprised by the ending because I read the plot summery on Wikipedia before I even bought the book, so I kind of knew what was gonna happen. But I still recommend that you read it. The next books on my reading list are ****_Mockingjay_**** (Which I am re-reading.), ****_Frankenstein, The Fault in Our Stars, Thirteen Reasons Why, The Giver, _****and****_ Beastly. _****Oh my, I'm going to be busy for awhile...**

**...But hopefully not to bussy to update! :)**

* * *

**This was originally uploaded to the Hi no Nami Blogspot on 2/13/14**


	9. Through the Eyes of a Child

**What unsavory characters does my aunt hang around?**

**"Kocchi Muite Baby" or "Come On, Look This Way Baby" by Ryo Featuring Hatsune Miku**

* * *

"Is the search for the Embryo progressing at all?" Director Hoshina asked.

"I can assure you that we've completed the preliminaries." Said Nikaidou Yuu. Nikaidou was an employee of Easter that was tasked with finding the Embryo.

The Embryo is a magical egg that can grant wishes. Or that's what they say. I don't buy any of that shit. It's all the product of a five-year-old's imagination and the manipulation of Easter. Anyone who goes after it is a fool in my opinion.

Nikaidou's plan to capture the Embryo was to collect X-Eggs from children who had lost faith in themselves and their dreams. He would then use the energy from those eggs to create an Embryo. Sounds ridiculous, right? When I first heard what he was planning to do, I thought he was a mental patient that had escaped from the looney bin. However, that was long after Nikaidou was ever-so politely asked to leave Easter. At the time, the most I knew about him was that he looked like the type that should be wearing a t-shirt that said "Potential Child Molester" all the time.

"There is a girl at Seiyo Academy's Elementary School called the Joker, who has three Guardian Eggs." Nikaidou continued. "Hinamori Amu. The Embryo should reveal itself near her. Of that, I've no doubt."

"Splendid." Director Hoshina said. "Continue to investigate her. Our company, Easter, shall employ any method necessary to secure the Embryo."

"Of course." Nikaidou said.

_Click, slam._

Ikuto walked out of the room unexpectedly, as usual. Haven't I taught that boy anything? You always leave an Easter meeting by saying "Go fuck yourselves in hell with a brick!". He needs to improve his manners.

"Jeez, he sure is unsociable." Nikaidou said in his happy, upbeat teacher voice.

* * *

Ikuto stood on Easter's roof, looking out on the city. It was quite beautiful up there, especially at night when all the lights of the city were lit up. Ikuto's Guardian Character, Yoru, sat on the safety rail.

"I don't like it-nya." The cat-like Guardian Character said. "Let's find the Embryo faster than them!"

"I'm not really in the mood today." Ikuto said.

"Ikuto!" Yoru whined. "Fine, I'll go look myself-nya!"

Yoru took off in search for the Embryo, leaving Ikuto somewhat alone on the roof. Ikuto opened up his hand and looked at the key he was clutching in his hand. It was called the Dumpty Key; one of the few mementos left by our birth father. I wonder what exactly was going through his mind as he stared at that crystal four-leaf clover shaped key…

All of a sudden Ikuto was grabbed from behind.

"Are you interested in her?" The blonde-haired girl asked. "In the girl whose lock matches your Dumpty Key?"

"Utau." Ikuto said.

"Ikuto." Utau said. "If it's for you, there's nothing I can't do. I'll definitely find the Embryo for you. No matter what."

I watched as they stood there, hair blowing in the wind. I don't think they knew I was there. I was sitting in the corner reading _Frankenstien _by Shelly Marry. I'm not offended because they didn't notice me. I'm small and blend in with the scenery well. That's part of the reason why I'm an assassin. The fact that I am probably one of the few eleven-year-olds outside of Uganda that has the will to kill is probably the rest of that reason.

Eventually, Utau's manager, Sanjo Yukari, came up and told Utau she had a photo shoot she had to go to and she was forced to let go of Ikuto. As soon as she was gone, Ikuto just got comfortable on the ground and took a nap.

I just sat up there and continued reading the book and once I finished it, I began reading it again. I was at the part where Caroline and Victor found Elizabeth in Milan when someone tapped me on the shoulder. I looked up to see messy blonde hair and grey-hazel eyes staring at me.

"Why, hello there, sweetheart." Logan said in a hushed tone.

"Back off, asshole!" I said as loudly as I could, although I knew it wouldn't wake Ikuto up. I swear, that boy could sleep through anything. We've had several fires and incidents where the carbon monoxide detector in our house went off and he's slept through half of them.

"Oh, no need to be so harsh." Logan said. "I'm not gonna do anything to you here."

"Then what is it you want?" I said even louder, just to make the point that I'm not gonna put up with any of his crap.

"Director Hoshina-sama wants you." Logan said.

_Of course the rapist bastard would address his enabler with the "sama" honorific._ I thought to myself.

"What does he want?" I demanded.

"I don't know." Logan said. "He just said to get you."

"Fine." I said as I got up. "I'll go find out for myself."

As I walked down the stairs that led to the door which led to more stairs, I heard Logan call out: "BY THE WAY, MARCI-KOI, NICE ASS!"

If I had a gun on a boat, I'd shoot him.

* * *

It took me a moment and a few deep breaths to forget about Logan and actually get myself in a calm enough mindset to talk to the Director. When I walked in, the blinds were closed, allowing the shadows to hide his face.

"Um, Director Hoshina?" I said.

"Sit." He commanded.

"Okay." I said. It scared me how quickly I had gone from seething with rage to having jittery nerves and panicking in my mind.

"I've been thinking about the proposition you made," He started. "and I must reject it."

It felt as if Earth suddenly didn't have an atmosphere anymore.

"What?" I said as I took a huge breath of air in.

"You are dismissed." He said.

"No, wait!" I said as I tried desperately to get life-giving oxygen into my lungs. "What do you mean, rejected?"

"You are dismissed." He said again.

"No!" I almost screamed that, I was in such a blind panic. "Why! Tell me why!"

He sighed in exasperation and muttered something about me being like my mother.

"I can't accept the offer because Ikuto and Utau are essential to this company's operations." He explained.

"How!" I demanded.

"That isn't necessary for you to know." He said.

"No, tell me how!" I shouted.

He gave another exasperated sigh and pressed a button on the phone.

"Watanabe-san," He said to his receptionist. "call security."

"No!" I shouted. "I am not leaving until you tell m- AH!" Before I could finish that sentence, the security agents rushed into the room and picked me up. Before I could process what was going on, they had me in the elevator which was descending to the lobby. Before I thought to fight back, my ass met the pavement outside the front doors.

* * *

**So I was talking to my mom and my aunt and my aunt told us that she wanted to get different locks on the garage apartment because if any unsavory characters were in the house, they wouldn't be able to get into the apartment and that prompted me to ask what unsavory characters she hangs around. Hopefully not those of the Trevor Philips variety.**

**Thank you to Kodochi Tsukasu and HanaLoid for the reviews on Google Re-Translate! It really means a lot even though Kodochi's wasn't all that positive...**

* * *

**This was originally uploaded to the Hi no Nami Blogspot on 2/16/14**


	10. We are Never Ever Getting Back Together

**Fair Warning: The title of this chapter may change on the version because it's so long.**

**"We are Never Ever Getting Back Together" by Taylor Swift**

* * *

**"We tried getting through the back; it was no good!" **

**"Those people are gonna die if we don't do something!"**

**"Oh my goodness, it's a fire."**

**"Come on, Coon Friends!"**

**"No- Eric, stay in the car, sweetie!"**

**"Can we try a helicopter?"**

**"The winds are too high. The chopper would burn in minutes."**

**"All right, what seems to be the problem?"**

**"Get back, kids. It isn't safe."**

**"Eric, poopsie?"**

**"Whatever's happening, you need help from the Coon."**

**"And friends!"**

**"Keep those children back, Thompson!"**

**"Pleas sir, you must let us-"**

**"Sweetie, let the nice firemen do their job."**

**"Shut! Up! Mom! God!"**

**"Wait. Look! Up in the sky!"**

**"It's him! My god, it's really him!"**

**"He's come to help us. Captain Hindsight!"**

**"Who's Captain Hindsight?"**

**"Captain Hindsight, the hero of the modern age. Once known as Jack Brolin, a reporter for the national news, the hero was born when a freak accident gave him the amazing power of extraordinary hindsight. From toxic spills to unjust wars there is no task too large for… Captain Hindsight!"**

**"Captain Hindsight, thank god you've come!"**

**"What's the skinny?"**

"MARCELINE, IKUTO, COULD YOU PLEASE TURN DOWN THE VOLUME!" My mom came into my room and shouted. "THERE ARE LITTERALLY PEOPLE IN HOKKAIDO COMPLAINING ABOUT THE NOISE!"

"WHAT?" Ikuto and I shouted in response. We were watching _South Park_ on the TV in my room and had the volume turned up to the max to block out the sounds of plates hitting the wall and our mother crying, begging our step-father to stop. We'd intervene, but the last time we did that, Ikuto got a concussion, I got a black eye and I broke our step-father's nose. I don't really want to go into detail about how we got all of those injuries…

"TURN THE VOLUME DOWN!" She shouted again. "THE POLICE ARE OUTSIDE AND ARE GOING TO FINE US IF WE DON'T TURN THE VOLUME DOWN!"

"OKAY!" I shouted. "FINE!" I turned the volume way down.

"Thank you." My mother said, sounding very relieved. "Jesus Christ, why'd you have it up so loud? I could barely hear you over that mindless show."

"Oh-no." Ikuto muttered under his breath.

"Well, **mother**," I said. "if you didn't marry that bastard we wouldn't have this 'mindless show' turned up so loud."

"Marceline, please don't start." Ikuto muttered.

"What was that?" My mother snapped.

"Oh, don't give her the attention, mother." Ikuto muttered.

"You heard damn well what I said." I snapped back.

"Do you guys just pick fights for no reason?" Ikuto asked aloud.

"Don't use that kind of language with me!" My mother shouted.

"I'll take that as a yes." Ikuto said.

"What?" I shouted. "Damn? That's not even a bad word! They don't even censor it out on TV! You wanna hear real bad language? Fuck, shit, ass, bitch, cunt!"

"You two have completely forgotten I'm in the room, haven't you?" Ikuto asked.

"A girl of your age should not be using that language!" My mother shouted. "Heck, a girl of your age shouldn't even be watching this sort of programing!"

"Once again, I'll take that as a yes." Ikuto said.

"A girl of my age?" I questioned. "How old do you think I am?"

"So you guys wouldn't notice if I jumped out the window?" Ikuto asked.

"Um…"

_Wow, she really doesn't know_. I thought.

"Nine?" She finally guessed.

"Later." Ikuto said as he leapt out my bedroom window.

"Mom, I am eleven." I said. "I have been eleven for six months, two weeks, and a day. Wow? Do you even know how old Ikuto and Utau are?"

"Uh… Fourteen and twelve?" She guessed.

"Ikuto is fifteen years, eleven months, three weeks, and three days old." I pointed out. "Utau is fourteen years, two weeks, and two days old. If you really did give a crap about us, you would know that shit."

"That's not true!"

"Of course it is and you know it is." I said as I grabbed my coat off the bed.

"Where are you going?" She demanded.

"Out." I said.

"Where?"

"Hell, that's where."

"Marceline!"

"Go fuck yourself bitch!" I shouted as I ran out of the house.

* * *

I can't believe how easy it is to sneak on to Asa Mokuzai Academy's grounds. I mean for god's sake, the Prime Minister's daughter goes to school here. You'd think security would be really tight, but from what I've seen, it's pretty lax.

This is the school Sarah attends. It's a bording school for the richest kids in Japan that also happen to have the most uninvolved parents in Japan. It's not that surprising seeing as her father is the furthest thing from a helicopter parent.

I knocked on the door. I had to do it pretty loudly because Sarah always sleeps with her headphones on. When she finally came out, she looked much disheveled and very pissed. She doesn't like being woken up.

"What the fuck, Shady?" She said when she answered the door. "I'm trying to sleep off a headache."

"Yeah." I said. "I'm sure all that loud music really helps with a headache."

"What is it that you want?" She asked.

"I got in a fight with my mom." I said. "Can I sleep on your extra bed?"

"Yeah, sure, whatever." She said.

"Thanks." I said.

Sarah has a small dorm room. It's so small that she only has two beds, a nightstand, and a small closet. She's lucky, though. She's supposed to share the space with a roommate, but the school stopped making her do that since she's more difficult to live with than my mother.

I climbed in the extra bed and Sarah curled back under her own covers.

* * *

I was standing in the middle of a parking lot. I don't know how I got there, but all of a sudden there were about eighty police cars chasing after me. I quickly thought to try and climb up a tree at the other side of the parking lot that had many leafy branches. I tried running to it but the closer I got to it, the longer the parking lot stretched. It was basically like I was running in place, but I knew I wasn't because if I was, the police cars would have caught me.

Eventually, I was able to reach the tree and climb up it but the police surrounded the tree and pointed these guns with laser scopes at the tree. There were over a hundred little red lights pointed at me. The policemen fired, but none of the bullets hit me. They all hit the branch I was sitting on and caused it to break out from under me. I fell out of the tree, but I didn't hit the ground. I just fell through a deep, dark hole in the ground.

The hole was essentially bottomless and no matter what I did, I couldn't stop falling. The last thing I heard before I woke up was: "Sequetur te dicam."

* * *

When I woke up, it was very early in the morning. Well, not that early. It was around six-thirty or seven o'clock. It was definitely early enough for school to have started or about to start. Sarah was already in her school uniform and was talking to someone outside the door. I'm certain it was another foreigner because I recognized that the conversation was in English. Fluent English to be specific. All the Ls I heard were pronounced correctly.

"I don't know about Saturday." Sarah said. "I think I have to go to some dinner party."

"How about Sunday?" Whoever at the door asked.

"I'm not sure…"

"How about I call you Sunday and take it from there?"

"Okay."

"Alright, I'll talk to you later."

"Talk to you later."

"Bye."

"Bye."

Sarah shut the door of her dorm room and went over to her nightstand to get a hair tie or something.

"¿De qué año es?" I asked.

"Good morning, Aurora." Sarah said. "It's twenty-thirty-eight."

"You sure?" I asked. "It feels like twenty-fourteen to me."

"I'm sure." She said.

"Who was that at the door?" I said as I sat up.

"Oh, just someone I know from class." She said dismissively as rummaged through her bag for something.

"Oh." I said as I stretched out. It really isn't comfortable sleeping in your regular clothes. "Well, I better get going. Thanks for letting me stay here."

"No problem." She said.

"Later." I said as walked out the door.

* * *

It was a decent November day. It looked like it might rain and it was pretty chilly out, but other than that it was pretty normal. I was walking down the main road, the one that led up to the castle-like building of Seiyo Academy's Elementary School. I was walking in the opposite direction of it, though, towards the more… Well, I don't want to say it's a poor area of town, but it was definitely was a lot nicer when I was little. You know, when the kids played with Barbie Dolls and Hot Wheels instead of Molly and Sig Saurs.

Once again, I wasn't paying as much attention as I should have been and someone came up behind me and wrapped their arms around my waist.

"Hello, Marci-koi." A familiar voice said.

_Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck,_ _fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck,_ _fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!_

"Huntzburger, I'm giving you ten seconds to let me go." I said. "If you don't you can say goodbye to your balls forever."

"Oh, Marci-koi," Logan said sweetly. "no need to be so harsh. I just wanted to hold you."

"Ichi."

"And kiss you." He started kissing my neck.

"Ni. San."

"And maybe a little something more…"

"Shi. Go."

"You're still counting?"

"Roku."

"Come on, you can't be serious."

"Nana."

"You can't seriously rip off my balls."

"Hachi."

"Can you?"

"Kyuu."

"Okay!" Logan shouted as he let me go. "Shit, Marceline! You don't have to take it that far!"

"You wrapped your arms around me when you knew I wouldn't be interested." I bluntly pointed out.

"That was different."

"You kissed my neck when I threated to remove your balls."

"That's because I love you!"

"You said 'And maybe a little something more…' when I was still wasn't responding to your advances, which implied that your motivations were sexual, not romantic."

"Come on, Marci-koi." Logan said as he tried to grab my arm.

"DON'T TOUCH ME, YOU BASTARD!" I shouted as loud as I could. That definitely got people's attention.

"Marceline, there's no need to be so loud…"

_Oh what? Are you nervous because people are suspicious of a twenty-nine-year-old trying to grab an eleven-year-old?_

"I DON'T CARE HOW MANY POKEMON CARDS YOU HAVE IN YOUR BASEMENT! I DON'T WANT TO GO WITH YOU! YOU'LL TOUCH ME IN MY NO-NO ZONE AGAIN!"

Before I knew it, at least twenty people were on their cellphones and a couple of angry looking women were quickly approaching Logan. They looked like the type of women who not only would know how to rip off Logan's balls with their bare hands, but make him eat them, shit them out and eat them again. Logan apparently realized this, because like the little coward he was, he took off. The women quickly followed him. Another woman, who was on the phone with the police, rushed over to me.

"Little girl, are you alright?" She asked.

"No." I sadly said.

"Did he hurt you?" She was clearly honestly concerned.

"No, I wanted to see him get his ass kicked."

* * *

"I'm here!" Logan said as he walked into his office at Easter, out of breath.

"Wow," Miku, his secretary said. "and with only two minutes left in the work day. New record!"

"Oh, shut up." Logan said. "I… I need to sit down. Get out of your chair."

"Shesh, pushy." Miku said standing up. "Must be some broad if she's making you run all over town."

"Ah..." Logan said as he sat down. "Just a girl I used to date. I've kinda been trying to win her back."

"Oh yeah?" Miku asked. "And how's that working out for you?"

"Not good…" Logan was still slightly out of breath. "I've tried everything."

"Everything?"

"Yeah, everything."

"Have you tried standing outside her house with a boombox playing Peter Gabriel?"

"What?"

"I'll take that as a no."

"Wait, what do you mean."

Miku sighed.

"If you stand outside a girl's house with a boombox playing Peter Gabriel, she has to take you back." She explained. "It's like a basic rule of romantic movies."

"I'm not so sure…" Logan said.

"Trust me." Miku said. "If you do that to a girl, she'll definitely take you back."

* * *

"All right, Butters, I think we've almost got the Chinese to trust us! Now as soon as they tell us their invasion plans, make a run for the door, okay?!"

"Okay, okay."

"Ho ho, that's a good one, Ping Ling. Hoho. So, ah, where were we? Oh yes, the invasion pran."

"Huh, invasion pran."

I was, once again, watching _South Park_. I while I was watching it, though, I thought I heard very loud music playing outside my window, but I ignored it.

"What day is American invasion again? I fohget."

"'Scuse me, miss?"

"Yes, sir?"

"These people won't leave us alone."

"MARCELINE, HOW MANY TIMES DO I HAVE TO TELL YOU TO TURN THE TV DOWN?!" My mom came in and shouted.

"IT'S NOT ME!" I shouted back. "FOR CHRIST'S SAKE, THE MUSIC IS CLEARLY COMING FROM OUTSIDE! ARE YOU TOO RETARDED TO REALIZE THAT?!"

"DON'T TALK TO ME LIKE THAT!"

"OH, GO FUCK YOURSELF!" Once again, I ended a fight by leaving.

"WHERE ARE YOU GOING?"

"TO MAKE THIS RETARDED ASS MOTHERFUCKER TURN HIS FUCKING MUSIC DOWN!"

_Whoever this jackass is, I am going to slaughter him._

* * *

Oh, surprise, surprise. How did I not see this coming? Logan Huntzburger is standing in front of my house, blasting Rick Astley on a stereo. That bastard doesn't give up, does he? Well, I probably should've realized that when he didn't stop when I screamed "NO!".

"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?" I shouted.

"WHY MARCI-KOI," He asked. "HELLO! HAVE I WON YOU BACK, YET?"

"WHAT?"

"HAVE I WON YOU BACK YET?"

"I HEARD YOU THE FIRST TIME! I JUST COULDN'T BELIEVE WHAT YOU SAID!"

"OH! WELL, I WAS TOLD THAT IF YOU STAND OUTSIDE A GIRL'S HOUSE AND BLAST PETER GABRIEL ON A STEREO, SHE HAS TO TAKE YOU BACK! I COULDN'T FIND ANY PETER GABRIEL SONGS, THOUGH, SO I USED RICK ASTLEY! I FIGURED THE EFFECT WOULD BE THE SAME SEEING AS PETER GABRIEL AND RICK ASTLEY ARE PRETTY MUCH THE SAME AMOUNT OF GAY!"

"THAT IS THE MOST RETARDED ASS THING I'VE EVER HEARD!"

"BUT IT'S WORKING, RIGHT?"

_God, I wish Japan had a Castle Doctrine. _

"OKAY," I shouted. "I'M GONNA GIVE YOU TEN SECONDS TO GET OFF MY PROPERTY OR ELSE!"

"OR ELSE WHAT?" Logan asked. "THE POLICE WON'T COME IF YOU CALL THEM AND JAPAN DOESN'T HAVE A CASTLE DOCTRINE, WHICH MEANS YOU CAN'T SHOOT ME!"

"ICHI! NI! SAN! SHI! GO! ROKU! NANA! HACHI! KYUU! JIYUU! THAT'S IT!"

"WAIT, WHERE ARE YOU GOING?"

I went inside the house and got some eggs out of the refrigerator. These weren't ordinary eggs though. These were eggs that had been sitting in the back of the refrigerator for approximately four years. I was saving them for an occasion like this.

I went upstairs to my room and started throwing the eggs out of my bedroom window. I pegged him with at least half of them. I can still see the look on his face; the look of disgust, anger, and horror that came along with getting hit with gross, rotten eggs.

_I hope you've got the message now, Huntzburger. I am never getting back together with you._

* * *

_**So many swears! Agh, my vocabulary is more colorful than usual because I've been watching nothing but**_**_South Park_**_** for the past few days. Ah! Please, Mom! For the love of god, install the freaking cable! I'm starting to feel like blowing my brains out from all the silence and **_**_South Park!_**_** AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!**_

* * *

**This was originally uploaded to the Hi no Nami Blogspot on 2/21/14**


	11. Amu's Afraid of Her Own Story

**Moving fucking sucks!**

**"Just Lose it" by Eminem**

* * *

"PULL!"

Sarah threw the Justin Bieber poster off the edge of the roof of the school and it slowly floated down until it collided with my arrow.

"Hey, Shady," Sarah said. "what are we doing, again?"

"We're shooting arrows at Justin Bieber merchandise." I thought that was obvious.

"I know, but why at an Elementary School?"

"Because ninety percent of Justin Bieber's fan base is between the ages of six and twelve." I explained. "When they come back to school tomorrow and see all the destroyed Justin Bieber merchandise, they'll cry and scream in pure agony!" I started laughing just thinking about it. "'Oh my god!'" I shouted in a high-pitched voice, imitating a Justin Bieber fan. "'Who would do something like this to Justin Bieber? The cold heartless bastards!" I almost fell to my knees laughing.

"Okay, that is kind of funny." Sarah said, giggling a little herself. "But seriously, don't you think that's mean to do to little kids?"

"Hey, they deserve it for worshiping a Canadian douche bag." I said. I pulled an arrow out of my sheath and got into position to shoot. "Okay, ready?"

Sarah picked up a Justin Bieber doll from the ground next to her.

"Ready!"

"PULL!"

Sarah threw the doll up in the air and I released the arrow so that it would stab Bieber through the abdomen once it reached the crest of the arc.

"Wow, nice one." Sarah said.

"Well, you know, I try." I said.

"Hey, do you think anyone will be bothered by the fact that we're up here?"

"Nah." I pulled one more arrow out of my sheath. "That no trespassing rule only applies when school is in session. If you come in here on a Sunday, it's perfectly fine."

"Oh, Okay." Sarah said.

"Ready?"

"Ready!"

"PULL!"

Sarah threw a CD case up in the air. I just about had a lock on i-

_"Do not test me_

_'Cause I'm the fucking king of the world_

_Get on your knees_

_I'm the fucking king of the world_

_Do as I please"_

"Gyah!" I released the arrow and sent it flying towards the main road.

"Sorry!" Sarah said as she pulled her phone out of her pocket. "I thought I had it turned off."

"Holy shit!" I exclaimed. That had really scared me. Not because it was so sudden, but the fact that it made me lose my aim. I've had gunshots go off next to my head and I didn't lose my aim. What was wrong with me?

"You okay?" Sarah asked when she saw that I was visibly shaken.

"Yeah." I said. "It's just… I'm fine."

"You sure?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. Just get another Justin Bieber thing, will you?"

"Okay."

Sarah walked back over to the pile of Justin Bieber merchandise we had accumulated and picked up what looked to be a Justin Bieber pencil case. I reached back to my sheath to get another arrow, but couldn't find one. I took off my sheath and looked at it to be sure.

_Yep, it's official_. I thought. _I am out of arrows._

"Damn it." I said.

"What's wrong?" Sarah asked.

"I'm out of arrows."

"Really?"

"Yeah. I'll be right back, I'm gonna retrieve the ones we already shot off."

"Okay."

I quickly took off down the stairs and to the main gates of the school. There were at least twenty pieces of Justin Bieber merchandise on the ground that was now torn, ripped, stabbed, sliced, and shattered into a million pieces on the ground. Although Sarah and I probably made Justin Bieber a thousand bucks richer in US dollars, it does my heart good to know that young, impressionable pre-teen girls will probably be heartbroken enough to commit suicide upon seeing that someone hated their favorite teen idol enough to destroy his merchandise in front of their school.

After wandering around in front of the school yard for twenty minutes and waving off Sarah's offers to help, I had found twenty-six of my twenty-seven arrows.

_That one arrow I lost didn't land in the schoolyard? That's odd._

Then I remembered that one arrow went flying towards the street.

_Crap! I better find it before someone drives over it!_

* * *

It turns out the arrow did not land in the street. It got lodged in the trunk of a tree across the street from the school. I have no idea how that happened. The trajectory, angle, and distance the arrow had to travel just don't make sense. I've been over it a thousand times in my mind and I just can't make sense of it. The best answer I can come up with is… Physics don't exist. Your teachers are lying to you. None of those rules work or apply in real life. It's all just one big crock of shit. Don't buy into it, kids.

At the time, though, I wasn't concerned about how the arrow got there as much as I was with getting it out. I just sighed and started to pull on it. I didn't want pull on it too hard because I was afraid that the arrow head would come off, but it was really stuck in there. I had to use a lot of elbow grease to get it out. When I did finally get it out the force of all that pulling sent me flying backwards, into a girl who was walking down the street behind me that I didn't see.

"Ow…" I groaned as I got off the girl. "Hey, watch where you're walking."

"What?" The girl said as she slowly sat up. She was wearing punk-goth clothing and had her pink hair pulled away from her face with a pair of red x-shaped hair clips.

"You should have been paying attention to where you were walking." I repeated. "Otherwise, I wouldn't have smashed into you."

"I was paying attention to where I was going!" She said, clearly outraged by the accusation. "You just weren't paying attention to what you were doing. Whatever it was you were doing…"

"I was pulling an arrow out of a tree." I explained as I held up the arrow. "It won't happen again."

"Ow…" The girl cried as she tried to stand up.

"Oh, do you need help getting up?" I extended my hand to help her up.

"Thanks." She said as she took it, stood up, and steadied herself. When she looked at my face, a look of déjà vu crossed her face. "I'm sorry, have we met before?"

I stopped and thought about it for a second.

"It's possible." I said. "I don't know… What's your name?"

"Hinamori Amu." She said. "Yours?"

"Slim Shady." I said. Don't ask me why, but I'm not too keen on giving strangers my real name.

"Slim Shady?" She repeated.

"You know," I said. "Slim Shady? Hotter than a set of twin babies in a Mercedes Bendz with the windows up when the temp goes up to the mid-eighties?" She didn't look like she was getting it. "Calling men ladies? Sorry Doc, but I've been crazy? There's no way that you can save me? It's okay, go with him Hailie?" Still a look of confusion. "Never mind, I have to get back to my friend."

"Okay." She said. "I guess I'll see you later."

"Alright…" I said awkwardly. "Bye…"

After I got across the street, I think I could almost faintly hear Amu say:

"Oh my god, that was weird."

_It was weird for me, too, Amu._

* * *

As I walked back onto the school yard, I saw Sarah being taken away by the police in handcuffs.

"Turns out that trespassing thing applies all the time." She said as she passed me.

A police officer asked me if I was with her and I just said "No entiendo español." and they left me alone.

* * *

**We're moving and there's a lot of inconvenience that goes along with it. Like not being able to find where shit is, not having cable, ect. I'm just glad all the shows I watch put off airing new episodes because of the Winter Olympics.**

**Anyways, hope you enjoy this. It was a little rushed, but oh well. Only one chapter left until I can publish this on ! **

* * *

**This was originally posted to the Hi no Nami Blogspot on 2/23/14**


	12. Amulet Clover

**You're still reading this? Why don't you go read something good, like "Poison Apple" by RobinRocks, or "Of Final Adventures and Last Years" by Sylph Dancer, or "Graceland" by Juliet's Shadow, or an actual book?**

**"I Love it" by Icona Pop**

* * *

If I died tomorrow, I would die knowing the following things are fact. Kim Kardashian looks like a hobbit in real life, anyone carrying a black notebook and talking to themselves is suspicious, and Tsukiyomi Ikuto is the best violin player that has lived or ever will live. Okay, that last thing is probably a very biased opinion, but it is true. I've never heard anyone-not even my father-play the violin as well as he does. Every time I hear him play, it's like I am a child again; that I am free to do whatever I want and become whatever I want. I feel safe and at ease. Not that many things in this world can make me feel that way.

When I was younger, I could never get him to play it for me. If I asked, he'd say no. If I begged, he'd tell me to leave him alone. If I threatened to kill myself, he'd tell me that I have some serious mental problems if I'm willing to go that far to hear him play the violin. If I actually tried to do it, he'd struggle with me for whatever it was I was trying to kill myself with and it would end with a trip to the hospital because one of us would get cut or lose hearing in one of our ears in the process.

When I was about nine, I discovered that Ikuto just didn't want to play in front of other people. So, if I ever happened to notice that he was leaving the house with his violin, I'd follow him, hide, and listen from a distance. I know that may seem a little… …stalker like… …but he is really that skilled!

Just to be clear, though, Kim Kardashian really does look like a hobbit in real life (I know, I've seen her.) and anyone who carries around a black notebook and talks to themselves **is suspicious**. Do **not** hang around those people.

One night not too long after Ikuto's sixteenth birthday I noticed him leave the house with his violin case slung over his back. I got really excited because I hadn't heard him play in a long time, so I followed him down an ally way, over a wall, through a wooded area, and came out into a shopping center. At the time, I questioned how he was able to do all that. I mean, I'm an assassin. I've had special training. I was able to keep up with his pace, but most normal people shouldn't be able to do that. I mean, that wall was at least twenty-feet high.

There are two ways to follow someone. The first way, they never notice you. The second way, they only notice you. I was trying my best to follow Ikuto using the first method of following someone. I was keeping my tread light and paid close attention to where I was going. I was doing a remarkably good job.

At one point, Ikuto stopped suddenly and looked at something. I didn't see what it was, but it must not have been important as he just continued on his way.

* * *

Ikuto came to stop at a flight of steps leading up to a white pergola with vines growing on it and an elliptical cement block to sit on underneath it. I hid in the woods about twenty-five or thirty paces away. Ikuto was about to take out his violin, when something made him stop.

"What's wrong, Yoru?" He said.

_Huh? Is he talking to someone?_ I looked around but didn't see anyone else there. He didn't have a cellphone, so I knew he wasn't talking to someone on the phone.

"I know you're hiding something." He said.

_Does he hear voices in his head, too because if he does, we probably should be worried about whether or not we have some sort of genetic condition?_

"It's pretty obvious that you are."

_I wonder if you can get welfare for having some sort of genetic condition…_

"So that's it." Ikuto said. Then for some reason he flicked the air, then closed his violin case and got up.

_Wait, where are you going?_ I thought as I got up to follow him.

"KILL ALL THE NON-BELIEVERS!" The voice in my head shouted.

**_SHUT UP VOICE!_**

* * *

I followed him to a house in the more nice part of town. He jumped up to a balcony and just stood there. I don't know what he was doing, seeing as the door didn't open. If he was saying anything, I was too far away to hear. Eventually, he jumped down from the balcony and began to walk away. Then someone came out from the house and shouted to him from the balcony.

"Hold on! How do you know that?" They said.

"Catch you later." Was all he said.

"Hang on!" But Ikuto had already walked off.

Tsukiyomi Ikuto equals bad ass.

Ikuto passed the wall I was hiding behind and I began to silently trail him. I heard him say something along the lines of "At the end of the day, we are enemies.", then he was quiet for several blocks before he suddenly stopped and said:

"Marceline, I know you're following me."

_Crap._

There are two ways to follow someone. The first way, they never notice you. The second way, they **only** notice you.

"How did you know?" I asked.

"I didn't." He said as he turned around. "I just stop every few feet and say that to make sure you aren't."

"No you don't." I said.

"How do you know?" He asked.

This is a trick.

"Okay!" I said. "I was following you! I really don't have a life so I have to stalk my sixteen-year-old brother all the time!"

"Finally, you've admitted it!" He said in mock overjoyment.

"Uh, you know the last part was sarcasm, right?" I had to make sure before he started teasing me.

"Of course." He said.

"Got it."

"So, how long were you following me for?" He asked.

"Since you left the house." I said.

"Why?"

"I don't know…" I said. "Boredom?" I shrugged. I really couldn't come up with a good lie in that moment. "Oh, do you hear voices in your head?"

"What."

"Voices in your head, do you hear them?"

"No." He said in both denial and concern. "Why, do you?"

"No, just making sure." I said in slight disappointment.

"RAPE AND PILLAGE IN THE GLORIOUS NAME OF SATAN!"

**_SHUT UP, VOICE!_**

* * *

**END OF PART I**

* * *

**Wow, if you're still reading after all of the shit I gave you, you probably deserve a medal or something. Quick! Someone call Sochi and tell them to make a special Olympic Gold Medal for anyone who reads up to this point! Oh wait, are the Winter Olympics still going on? I don't know, I wasn't following that.**

**I feel good about this chapter. Granted, I ripped most of this off from the anime, but still.**

**This is going up on hopefully tonight. I don't know... I might pass out halfway through uploading this stuff, so who knows. **

**Just so you know, you don't need to feel obligated to review. I don't write this because I wanna get the most reviewed fic on the site or whatever, I write this because I can't get the fucking story out of my head. Seriously, I've had this story in my mind since late twenty-ten and haven't been able to get it out of my mind since! I need to write this, otherwise I think I might go crazy!**

**...Not that I'm not already crazy but...**

**Anyways, if you do decide to review this I will respond, most likely with a smiley face or something. Even if you condemn me to a thousand years of torture by the Demon Lord Cthulhu.**

**Thank you for reading up to this point if you have. :)**

* * *

**This was originally uploaded to the Hi no Nami Blogspot on 2/24/14**


	13. Part II: The Key

"If one person can say something to make someone feel bad, then maybe another person can say something to make him feel good."

-Unknown


	14. A Confession in a Graveyard

**M does not mean lemon.**

**"Remember Me" by Eminem Featuring RBX and Sticky Fingaz**

* * *

"What is a nightmare? The dictionary tells us it is a terrifying dream. A nightmare… A nightmare… A nightmare…"

Did you know that the drive from Toride, Ibaraki to Hanamaki, Iwate is nearly five hours? Plus, when you add in that Easter didn't want to drive me themselves and I had to take a bus there and I couldn't afford to take an express bus that five hour drive turned into seven hours. Oh, and let's not forget that oh-so-wonderful bitch that had to get in a fight with the bus driver over letting her "Seeing Eye Dog" on the bus. It was pretty obvious that she was faking because, one, the dog she was trying to get on the bus was a pit bull. They generally don't use pit bulls for Seeing Eye Dogs because if the dog bites someone, its jaw will lock up and a lot of times when that happens, they have to kill the dog and break its jaw just to get it to let go of the person. And two, when the bus driver pointed at her and said "either leave the dog or get off the bus" she responded with "stop pointing at me". Stupid, dumb bitch.

Ah, yes. Let's not forget the two-hour delay we had on Highway Four because it started freaking snowing and the bus driver had to pull over 'cause he couldn't see. That gives us a grand total of… Ten hours of my life wasted! I'm never gonna get those ten hours back! Oh, I swear to god, one day I am just going to set the Easter building on fire, disable all the fire alarms, and tell the local fire departments that any calls coming saying that the Easter building is on fire is a fake stunt by the hacking group Anonymous and not to take the reports seriously. However, I'm not going to because with my luck, Ikuto or Utau would be in the building and get killed, too. God, I fucking hate Easter.

Now, you may be wondering why Easter would be sending me to a town nearly five-hundred kilometers away. Well, that's easy! They want me to kill someone! But why do they want me to kill someone? 'Cause they're jerks! Pricks! Assholes! Bastards! They don't give me a reason, they just tell me to do it. The only reason why I knew what happened with Mr. Thompson because I was speaking with the Director when he came bursting in and demanded to know what the fuck was up with the company's operations. With this guy, I had no idea what he did to piss Easter off. All I know was his name was Matsushita Ayumu, he was staying in a hotel room in Hanamaki, and that he had mid-length, straight, dull blonde hair, brown eyes, and was of average height for a Japanese man.

I sat on the bus in my normal assassin's uniform, only I had a black trench coat over it because it was so god damn cold! It's only the second week in December! If it's this cold already, I don't wanna imagine what the rest of the winter is going to be like.

I looked out the window at the snow-covered ground. I always hate how dead everything looks in the winter. The trees have no leaves and when snow isn't covering the ground, the grass is all lifeless. My favorite time of the year is spring. It's warm, but it's not too warm. The plants come back to life, giving us magnificent flower buds in shades of pink, purple, and yellow. Let's not forget the Cherry Blossoms that Japan is famous for. But, I think my favorite part about spring is something that most people find a pain in the ass. The Dandelions. They're usually some of the first flowers you see in the springtime. To me they kind of represent… I don't know… Hope, I guess.

However, the world outside the bus looked grey and dead. I sighed and decided to just look at my feet instead of the depressing exterior environment. I was listening to the song "Groundhog Day" by Eminem on my iPod. At least that seemed to make the time go by a little bit faster.

"All right passengers," The bus driver said. "we should be pulling into Hanamaki Station shortly, provided that nothing else goes horribly wrong."

"Thank god." I said in relief. A number of other people also seemed to be relieved at this announcement.

THUMP! BANG! THUMP! BANG!

_Oh crap._

"Uh, sorry folks." The bus driver said. "I'm gonna have to pull over and see what we hit."

Nearly everyone let out an audible groan. The bus pulled off to the side and the driver got out. For a few seconds, the only sounds you could hear were the low whispers of other passengers and the music coming out of other people's headphones which were turned up way too loud. Then there was a scream.

A number of passengers, including myself, raced off the bus. What we saw was the bus driver crouched over the body of a boy in an orange parka. A boy in a red poof-ball hat and a boy in a green ushanka stood nearby and just said, in reaction to their friend being murdered:

"Oh my god! You killed Kenny!"

"You bastard!"

* * *

I quickly sprinted across the lobby of the hotel, so fast that the entire lobby was a blur around me. I didn't want anyone to notice me going in there and walking down the hall without checking in. Of course, they could just assume I was a call girl, but I don't want to be seen like that. I ain't no whore.

Once I got around the corner, I quickly looked around to check and see if anyone working the front desk noticed me. It didn't look like it, so I continued on my way. The hallways looked pretty average for a hotel with worn red carpet and off-white walls. As I passed each and every doorway, I paid close attention to the gold numbering hanging at normal eye-level on each door.

The room Matsushita was supposed to be staying in was room four-oh-four. It took me awhile to figure out that the first number stood for the floor level and the last two stood for the room number. People say that I'm smarter than I give myself credit for. Those people obviously haven't seen me fuck up as bad as this. I mean, seriously, I was screaming suspicious at the top of my lungs by wandering around lost like that. If a security guard approached me, I'd be screwed. I blame Easter. They didn't give me a map of the building or blueprints or anything I could have used to find my way around that place. Then again, the blueprints for any building in any town are readily available at the town hall, so the blame is really on me there seeing as I didn't think of that… I should probably be executed for being so retarded.

Once I figured it out, I quickly made it to the fourth floor. Luckily for me, Matsushita was dumb enough not to lock the door to his hotel room. (Jesus Christ, that's scarily dangerous!) He was in the shower at the time, so he didn't hear me come in. I quickly got into position. The bathroom was just to the left of the front entrance, so I just went to the wall opposite the entrance, which was just past the TV and the bed. I stood in the proper stance one should use when shooting a bow and arrow; with my legs spread apart and the bow held out fully at arm's length, ready to let my arrow fly.

It didn't take long for him to get out of the shower. A millisecond after stepping out of the bathroom, the arrow pierced his brain. Blood and brain matter splattered everywhere. It coated the ceiling, the floor, the walls, even I and I was standing approximately two and a half meters away.

I slowly stepped over to Matsushita's body and felt for a pulse. It was official, he was dead.

I suddenly felt like my lungs were quickly filling with water and I couldn't breathe. It was like I swallowed a bunch of rocks and then decided to jump into the deep end of the pool. I was drowning and I couldn't swim back up to save myself. I began to panic and quickly in took and expelled oxygen from my lungs. My vision began to blur and I fell to my knees.

_Okay Marceline, you need to calm down now before you pass out._

I tried to take slow, deep breaths, but that just made me feel even dizzier. How do people find that calming? Well, I guess if you're dizzy you can't panic, so I guess it kind of works…

Once I figured out that deep breathing wasn't working, I pretty much was like "fuck it" and began looking for the hotel room key. Unlike a lot of the newer hotels, this one still uses old-fashioned lock and keys. Once I found it, I left the room and locked the door behind me. After that, I bounded out of the building.

* * *

I somehow ended up in a graveyard near the hotel. I sat on the ground with my back against a headstone and my face buried in my knees.

_Why do I keep doing this? Killing people like this… I didn't even know anything about this guy and I… I… Are Ikuto and Utau really worth this? Are they really worth the nightmares and the guilt and my sanity? Oh, what am I thinking? Of course they are! If there's any possibility that they could live happy, normal lives as a result of my actions I have to take it! Right? But… But still… To… To take a human life like that… I…_

I began bawling even more heavily into my knees.

"T-this is a-a-all that stu-u-upid bastard's f-fau-ult." I muttered into my knees. "I-If he-e-e ha-a-and't l-left u-u-us, I-I wouldn't b-be here ri-right now."

And here I am playing the blame game again. I don't mean to blame others for things that are not my fault, it's just human nature. Humans have been conditioned to avoid getting into trouble at all costs. From the first "bad thing" we do as a child, we learn that doing something that is generally considered wrong will be met with punishment. Humans don't like punishment. That is why when we are confronted with wrongdoing we either do one of two things: We lie and say we never did it, or we admit the wrongdoing but blame others who had nothing to do with what we did wrong for forcing us into a position where we had to do what we did wrong. It's horrible, but it's just the way we are.

My dearest apologies to my father, though. I honest to god wasn't thinking right when I said that.

After a few more minutes of playing the blame game with my father, my mother, and Director Hoshina, I returned to quietly sobbing into my knees. While I sat there, I did contemplate running away or committing suicide, but decided that it wasn't in anyone's best interests for me to do that. If I died or were to suddenly go missing, Easter would have nothing between them and the ability to rule over Ikuto and Utau's lives like evil dictators more than they already do.

I stopped crying after a few hours, but I didn't have the will to get up. It wasn't that I wanted to die via freezing to death, but that I was so exhausted from crying I felt like I could fall asleep right there. I knew how dangerous that was. If I somehow didn't die of exposure, I would probably get pneumonia. That wouldn't be good seeing as when I get sick, I **really **get sick. I remember when I was three I got the common cold and had to be hospitalized for a few weeks. You know, if my mother didn't get Eclampsia when she was pregnant with me, I might not have been born premature and my immune system might have been able to develop fully.

While I tried to find the will to get up, I thought I heard footsteps coming towards the graveyard. That is the last thing I need right now, to be caught in a graveyard covered in blood. Best case scenario, they think I was burring a body without permission. Worst case scenario, they think I'm some kind of pervert. Either way, I'd go to jail for a few hours.

I figured if I stayed absolutely quiet and didn't get up from where I was sitting; whoever it was that was coming wouldn't notice me and eventually go away. As the footsteps came closer and closer, I began to hear the voices that belonged to the beings that were slowly crunching through the snow and making their way up the hill.

"S-say…" A girl said.

"Yes?" Another responded.

"U-um, what was it again?" The first girl said. At that point it sounded like they had stopped in their tracks. "That's right. Awhile back, you said you have someone you like. Who might that-" I guess she regretted saying that already, so she abruptly stopped talking.

"Oh, that." The other girl said.

Then it was quiet for a second, and it sounded like someone was pulling something out.

"A dog?" The first girl asked.

"She's a girl." The second girl said. "Her name's Betty."

_Huh, my little brother had a dog with that same name._ I thought. _Small world._

"We'd been together since I was born," The second girl continued. "but she died last year."

"So the person you like…"

"She was definitely the girl I liked most." The second girl said. "I'm not very good at handling confessions. So I always Character Change and let Kiseki turn girls down." Just to note, I think I might have misheard something there. Also, there are apparently a lot of lesbians in this town.

"But now, there is a girl who's always on my mind." She continued. "She suddenly appeared before me. We were both Guardians, so I felt it was wrong. But I couldn't forget about her. I'm just going to say it, Hinamori-san!"

_Wow, that girl has the same last name as the girl I met the other day. I wonder if they're related…_

"Y-yes!" The first girl said.

"It was the first time I'd ever seen a girl so bright, cheerful, and strong!" The Second girl said. "A girl like Amulet Heart!"

Call me manically psychotic all that you want, but I really had to resist the urge to burst out laughing. Yeah, I know, that's really terrible and heartless considering I just murdered someone not even three hours ago, but damn it, I just found this so fuckin' funny. Oh, and it's not because that they're lesbians. I'd laugh if a straight girl got rejected by a straight guy, too. I don't know, man, it's something about other people's misery that I find hilarious. Like when that bus explosion happened on Highway three-sixteen and all those orphans died, I just couldn't stop laughing over it for days. Yes, I know, I'm a really sick fuck who should be committed.

"What?" The first girl said. "So, uh, you like me after a Chara Nari." Once again, might have misheard something there.

"'L-like' may not be exactly…" The second girl said, now kind of embarrassed.

Then some snow fell off of a tree branch, and it caused the first girl to scream. Then I guess something else must have happened because the first girl shouted: "Sorry!"

"It's okay." The second girl happily said.

"Did we scare you?" I heard a third girl say as she and two others walked through the graveyard towards the two girls talking near the entrance.

_Wait, when did they get here? I didn't hear them at all!_

"Oh, it was you guys." The second girl said.

"You weren't supposed to make any noise!" A fourth girl whined.

"Really?" A guy said.

"Let's go, Hinamori-san." The second girl said.

Then I heard five sets of footsteps making their way out of the cemetery. After that, I finally had the motivation to get up, go to the bus station, and go home.

* * *

If I didn't hate Easter before, now I really do. The next bus headed for Ueno Station, which is where I would have to get off to switch from a bus to a train to get to Toride wasn't coming until five o'clock the next day. This meant I had to sleep on those hard plastic chairs, freak out from a nightmare in front of strangers, break my personal rule about not using public restrooms twice, and break my personal rule about never eating at McDonald's. When it finally came time to board the bus, I felt like tap dancing. I couldn't wait to get home.

I was putting my backpack in the overhead compartment when I heard the bus driver say, "Ma'am, dogs aren't allowed on the bus". I looked over and saw a skinny blonde girl holding a Chihuahua in her hands.

"But, sir," She said. "I'm blind."

_Oh, fuck._

* * *

**Yeah, it didn't occur to me when I rated the version of this that someone might read it expecting it to be porn. I mean, I hate to say it, but a lot of M rated stuff is porn. I mean, not all of it is. "Graceland" by Juliet's Shadow is rated M, but it's not porn. But all the rest... Yeah, it's porn.**

**Nothing new going on in my boring little life other than I haven't been in school for a month and I'm starting to get very bored... *Sigh***

* * *

**This was originally uploaded to the Hi no Nami Blogspot on 3/6/14**


	15. I'm Gonna Kill You

**Merry Christma- It's March.**

**"Back to December" by Taylor Swift**

* * *

"_Mitsumenaide tsukamaenaide_

_Mayoikonda BUTTERFLY_

_Jiyuu utau dare ni mo mienai hane_

_Kakushiteru no anata no mune no oku"_

"Stop! Stop! Stopping!" The dance teacher exclaimed as the music abruptly stopped, causing Utau to cease her movement. "That was very, very bad dancing! Absolutely atrocious, Utau-chan!"

"My motions were perfect." Utau pointed out, frustrated that they were stopping in the middle of the song **again**, and that she was probably gonna be forced to start from the beginning **again**. "My rhythm as well."

"Sure, of course." The teacher said. "But your dancing has no soul. A dance with no soul cannot captivate the hearts of the audience!"

* * *

Utau sat in the corner of the room with a towel draped over her head. Her manager, Sanjo Yukari walked over to her.

"There isn't much time left before your concert." Yukari said. "We'll have problems if you're like this."

Utau just stayed silent.

"I told you this isn't a game." Yukari continued. "You are working for the Easter Company. You signed the contract. You can't just sing and dance as you please."

Utau, once again, stayed silent.

"I see." Yukari said. "So you don't care what happens to Ikuto-kun."

That got Utau's attention. She suddenly stood up and threw the towel off her head.

"Once more, from the top please." Utau said.

"Wow!" The dance instructor exclaimed, having heard nothing of the conversation that took place between Utau and Yukari. "You're finally eager to learn! I'm so happy!"

_Such a cute girl._ Yukari thought as she looked on at Utau.

* * *

"CD Sales were higher than expected." Yukari explained to Director Hoshina. "The project is progressing at an excellent pace."

It was a late December evening. It was the last official business day for many people in Easter's Main Headquarters. Many people were exhausted and just couldn't wait to get home to their families. Director Hoshina, however, was frustrated with the lack of progress made this year and couldn't wait for January Third to roll around so that way he could get back to work bossing other people around so that way they would do the work for him.

"Her singing has a special power." Yukari continued. "I'll find the Embryo very soon."

Ah, another promise that cannot be fulfilled.

"However…" Director Hoshina said. "Doesn't this Hoshina Utau girl have a number of issues?"

Depends on what you mean by issues. She has a brother complex, her mother sucks as a parent, her father's absentee, her sister is a psychopath who killed her guinea pig when she was six and her sister was four, she pushed her sister down the stairs for murdering said guinea pig, she gets PMS really bad…

"Any potential irregularities she may have can be found in any girl her age." So, it's normal for your sister to murder your guinea pig? "I'll be in control. You needn't worry."

"Hello." Nikaidou Yuu said in his happy, up-beat teacher voice as he came into the room. "Sorry about being late. I had to show up at work even though it's winter break. It's not easy being a teacher."

"Disgusting." Yukari said. "Hey, Yuu. Don't use that character outside of school."

Nikaidou laughed. "It's somehow become a habit."

"How can you call yourself a teacher when you hate children?" Yukari asked.

"It's all part of my plan to efficiently collect eggs from weak children." Nikaidou explained.

"Oh?" Yukari said. "The Embryo is a special egg. It should be hidden in children filled with hopes and dreams. That's where my Utau comes in handy."

Oh please, tell me more about **your **Utau. Did you know I murdered her guinea pig when she was six and I was four? (To be clear, it wasn't out of malice. It looked cold, so I tried to warm it up. …By sticking it in the microwave… My mom took my bike away for that…)

"I'll be the one to find the Embryo." Nikaidou declared.

"Not if you keep failing." Yukari pointed out. "Carry on as long as you like, you'll never find the Embryo. Not with your slow methods."

"That's enough." Director Hoshina said, frustrated. "I don't care which method is used. Find the Embryo for Gozen without delay."

"You can count on me, Director."

"I will surely deliver the Embryo to Gozen."

Ah, ass kissing. If there's anything anyone in the corporate world is good at, it's ass kissing.

* * *

Although Ikuto may claim that I purposely followed him, this time, I swear it was a complete accident. I was really tired, I didn't want to sleep at home, Sarah said I'm not allowed in her dorm during the day, and Easter got a bomb threat so no one was allowed in any restricted areas (A.K.A. the roof) until the police where done going around the place with the device sniffing dogs. I didn't want to go to my private place seeing as I had a feeling Logan was following me, so I went to the park, climbed a tree and fell asleep in the tree. Not very private considering it was December and almost all the leaves had fallen off the tree, but whatever.

When I fell asleep it was nearly two o'clock in the afternoon and this section of the park was pretty much vacant. So, imagine my surprise when I woke up at nine o'clock at night hearing a piece I know my brother composed himself. If I fell out of the tree, cracked my skull open, and had all my brains fall out right then and there, I would have died happy. Although this particular piece is actually kind of sad, it still makes me happy to hear him play.

Apparently it must have made someone else happy to hear him play, because he stopped abruptly in the middle of the piece.

"What are you doing here?" Ikuto asked.

"N-Nothing." I heard a familiar girl's voice say.

I heard Ikuto walk over to something.

"You're stopping?" The girl asked.

"Yeah." He said.

She then ran up the stairs that led to the pergola.

"Are you leaving?" She asked. "You're not going to finish that song?"

"It's done." No it's not. You still have another fifty measures. Play!

"Huh? Why?" She asked.

Ikuto didn't give a response.

"Aren't you going to play by the street over there?" She asked. "More people would hear you that way."

_I tried making that same argument, honey._ I thought.

"I'm not playing for people to listen."

_That's the same response I got._

"You eavesdropper."

_Well, he didn't call me an eavesdropper._

"Y-you were the one playing out in the open!" She pointed out.

Ikuto walked closer to the girl.

"Wh-what?" The girl said.

"Don't tell anyone about this." Ikuto said.

"U-um…"

"It'll be a secret between you and me; just the two of us."

It was silent for a minute.

"I-if you insist, I guess I m-might be willing to keep quiet." She stuttered.

I didn't hear what Ikuto said, but it made her retaliate with "Shut up!". Then I guess he must have said something else and she responded with "Th-That was on purpose! Why would I ever stutter?".

"See ya." Ikuto said.

"Wait!" The girl called out. "Play just one more time!"

"Don't want to."

_Oh, come on, Ikuto! Please!_

"Come on! Please?" The girl begged. "I want to hear your violin again. Your playing was kind of sad. But it was really beautiful, too."

That made him stop.

_Hey, I said that about your playing, too and you just told me to fuck off! Not fair!_

"So, please?" The girl asked.

It was quiet for a moment again.

"Have you forgotten?" Ikuto asked. "We're enemies."

"Enemies?" She questioned.

Ikuto started walking again.

"The Easter people are getting serious." He said. "Now's your last chance to get out."

_Easter? What do they have to do with anything? Who is he talking to?_

I climbed down from the tree and saw that girl I met when I was destroying all that Justin Bieber Merchandise, Hinamori Amu. For a second I wondered how Ikuto knew her and what she had to do with Easter, but then a more devilish idea came to mind.

_She's just standing there, mouth-a-gape, not paying any attention to her surroundings. I could…_

I slowly crept up behind her, making sure my steps were quiet and my breathing was unnoticeable until I was directly behind her. I leaned in so that way my lips were right behind her ear.

"I'm gonna kill you." I whispered.

She then slammed her elbow into my stomach, screamed, and ran off. When Ikuto came back because he heard the screaming, he just saw me on the ground laughing my ass off.

* * *

Well, it turned out that bomb threat was a false alarm (DAMN IT!) and they unlocked all the doors that are supposed to be for authorized personal only and let unauthorized personnel go into those places again. That's really stupid, but oh well.

Ikuto was laying on the helicopter landing pad (Which is probably even stupider, but oh well.), trying to take a nap. He couldn't sleep, though. He couldn't get what Amu said out of his mind.

"Your playing was kind of sad. But it was really beautiful, too."

Why didn't that work when I tried saying that to him?

He pulled out the Dumpty Key, held it by the chain over his head, and stared at it.

"Are you thinking about her?" Utau asked. "The girl whose lock goes with that key."

Ikuto sat up. "Not really." He said as he stuck the key back in his pocket.

"Ikuto." Utau suddenly said as she dropped to her knees and hugged him. "Ikuto, I have a request to make. I want to see you tonight, no matter what it takes. Because it's Christmas Eve."

**Ring, ring, ring, ring, riiiiiiiiing.**

**Ring, ring, ring, ring, riiiiiiiiiing.**

Utau got up and pulled her out her cellphone. She had gotten a text message from Yukari.

The party starts in two hours. You better not be late.

"Work?" Ikuto asked.

"Yeah." Utau said sadly. "I barely have any free time these days." She closed her phone. "I should be able to sneak out around eight. I'll be waiting. I'll be waiting." She sounded very sad and desperate when she said it the second time. "You have to come."

Utau then quickly ran across the roof and over to the stairs, as she didn't want to keep Yukari waiting any longer. As she was about to turn the corner, she saw someone standing there and stopped.

"A date on Christmas Eve." Nikaidou said. "How romantic."

Utau just ignored him and stomped up the stairs, pissed that that asshole had heard something so private and personal.

Ikuto had slung his violin over his back when Nikaidou started coming up the star.s

"She's so earnest it brings a tear to my eye." Nikaidou said as he climbed up the last few steps. "That girl would do anything for you. She'd even choose to do very bad things."

Wait, are we talking about Utau or me? Because what Utau's doing is defiantly considered as bad as putting a crayon in the markers bin compared to what I'm doing.

"How long are you gonna act like an outsider, Tsukiyomi Ikuto-kun?" Nikaidou asked in his happy, up-beat teacher voice. But then he switched to his normal voice for the second half of what he had to say. "You should hurry up and realize you're the reason she's falling to the dark side."

Yeah, we're talking about Utau. I've been on the dark side of the force since I was born.

Nikaidou put his hand on Ikuto's shoulder, but Ikuto brushed it off and left.

"I'll make you work hard." Nikaidou said as he watched Ikuto walk away. "For my purposes."

* * *

"Come back here, Utau!" Yukari exclaimed as she watched Utau walking as fast as possible down the hall. "You still have to meet with everyone! Wait!"

There were a bunch of important executives at that party and Utau was making herself look very bad by just walking out like that. But, she didn't care. She was going to see Ikuto, and that's all she cared about.

_Ikuto. _Utau thought as she began running down the hall.

"Utau!" Yukari called after her. She gave up when she realized Utau wasn't gonna turn around and come back. "Honestly." She muttered.

* * *

"The party was fun!" Amu's Guardian Character, Ran exclaimed.

"Yep!" Miki agreed. "A huge blast!"

"Tadase-kun as a lion was super cute, wasn't he-desu?" Su asked.

"Y-you think?" You could tell that Amu was going to start blushing any second now. "It wasn't anything special, was it?" She said trying to suppress the blush and keep her "cool-and-spicy" character intact.

"It had you pretty giddy." Miki pointed out.

"Oh zip it!" There's the blush!

Ran giggled, but then stopped when she realized something was wrong.

"Huh?" Amu said. "What's wrong?"

"I can sense an X-Egg." Ran said.

"She's right." Miki said. "It's really big."

"I have a bad feeling about this-desu." Su said nervously.

"Let's go." Amu said.

"Yeah!" All three of her Guardian Characters said in unison.

* * *

Amu and her Guardian Characters ran into the park to find a number of people with their heart's eggs turned into X-Eggs. She looked around in horror. She had never seen so many X-Eggs in one place before.

"There are a lot of them." She said in shock. She walked around the area of the park where she found them. They were all musicians that she had seen the day before when she went into the park looking for the beautiful song she heard. She remembered how enthusiastic and lively everyone was. "They were all having so much fun yesterday."

"Ah, Amu-chan!" Ran exclaimed as she pointed over to a figure standing several feet away, surrounded by X-Eggs. He turned to look at her, and she realized it was Ikuto. (Like the cat ears and tail didn't give it away.)

"Ikuto!" Amu exclaimed.

* * *

Utau stood in the middle of a shopping plaza by a large Christmas Tree. She looked at her watch. It was eight-twenty.

"Ikuto." She muttered. He was twenty minutes late.

_Is he coming?_ She wondered in her mind. _No, don't worry. He won't forget. He'll come._

She hoped she was right.

* * *

Snow had begun to fall.

Amu and Ikuto stood there staring at each other. Then, Amu tried to get closer.

"Stay back!" Ikuto shouted.

Amu stopped dead in her tracks.

"Stay away from me." Ikuto said.

"Ikuto!" Amu exclaimed.

Suddenly a mass of black energy pushed Amu back. Once it stopped, Ikuto and the X-Eggs were gone.

Amu thought she heard her Guardian Characters say something, but she just stared at the spot where Ikuto had been standing before. Then, looked up at the sky, trying to make sense of what had just happened.

* * *

_He's not coming. _Utau was slowly beginning to accept that thought more and more.

"Ikuto." She muttered. She felt like crying. This was the first time this had ever happened to her; first time someone didn't show up when they said they were gonna be there. (That is, unless you don't count the time our mother left us at Toys R Us saying she'd be back in twenty minutes and didn't come back until a store manager called her six hours later.)

She looked up at the sky, still clinging to the hope that he would show up.

* * *

Ikuto was walking down the street. He took the longest way he knew home. He just wanted to be alone for a while. He stopped when he passed a church, and looked up at the sky, wondering whether what he was doing was right or not.

* * *

**Yeah, I ripped off the Anime. Deal with it. ****This is one of my favorite episodes in the Anime. That's why I couldn't help but rip it off. I was gonna put in Logan harassing Marceline again, but decided against it. **

**Most of this is crap, though. I just mostly did it because I'm trying to stall myself from reading this fic called "Misery Business" 'cause I'm not so sure about the pairing in the fic. I read the prologue, and so far it's good. But, I can't help but blush when I read it and think "This is weird! I've never pictured them together like this! This is so weird but I can't stop reading!". But the same thing happened when I started reading LxLight stuff and that's one of my OTPs now, so...**

* * *

**This was originally uploaded to the Hi no Nami Blogspot on 3/8/14**


	16. Butterfly's Labyrinth

**YES! Finally a chapter with a capitalized "L" in the title!**

**"Meikyuu Butterfly" or "Butterfly's Labyrinth" by Nana Mizuki**

* * *

"What's up people?" I asked as I jumped down into the basement. Most people would break their necks doing that. Most people. I am not most people.

"Not much." Kimura mumbled.

"Akiko bought us chocolate!" Chouko exclaimed excitedly. I think this might be the first time she's eaten all year.

"I TOLD YOU NOT TO SPEAK, BITCH!" Kimura shouted.

"Hey!" I said as I slapped him off the back of the head. "Be nice to the lady."

"Stay out of it, whore." Kimura slurred.

"Thanks for the compliment." I said as I sat down next to Sarah. "Chocolate me."

Akiko threw a bar of chocolate to me across the room. It was Milk Chocolate. Not my favorite, but it was better than nothing.

"Merry Late Christmas." Akiko said.

"Thank you." I said.

"Oh, speaking of Christmas…" Sarah reached in her bag and pulled out a box wrapped in red and silver-stripped wrapping paper. "…I got you a present."

"I don't want it." I said, pushing the box away.

"Oh, come on." Sarah said.

"No, I don't want you spending your money on me."

"I didn't spend anything on this."

"Liar."

"No, I'm serious. I didn't spend anything on this."

"Yeah, right."

"Fine then." Sarah said. "Don't take it. Anyone want this?"

"I'll take it." Kimura said.

"I change my mind, I'll take it." I said snatching the present out of Sarah's hands.

I pulled off the wrapping paper and opened the packaging to find two iPhones; a black iPhone Four and a white iPhone Four S.

"Oh my god." I said.

"They're my old ones." Sarah explained. "I wasn't sure what model or color you'd want so I just gave you both."

"You shouldn't have." I said. "Why'd you give me this?"

"Have you seen your phone?" Sarah said. "It's a Nokia 3100 that's only being held together by duct tape. I'm surprised it can still make calls."

"Well, that's all I need it to do!" I exclaimed. "And my phone works fine. Watch." I pulled it out and pressed where the numbers 1-1-4 should be on the phone and then hit speakerphone. (I was trying to call directory assistance.) There were a few crackly sounding rings before someone picked up.

"Tori- poli- at's yo- emer- cy?" The operator said on the other side.

"What?" I said.

"To- de pol- dep- men- wha- i- the eme- en-" Okay, maybe my phone's a little old.

"Uh, can I have the number for…" I paused for a second to think of a place I legitimately didn't know the number for. "Yeah, can I have the number for Domino's Pizza?"

"Aw, dude." Akiko said. "You're gonna get Domino's? They fucking suck!"

I shushed her.

"I'm so- at wa- at?" And maybe it's been dropped a few times…

"Uh, I said I wanted the number for Domino's Pizza." I said. "Preferably one near Toride, Ibaraki."

"I'm so- the con- tion mu- be ba- can yo- sa- at aga-" …Into a pond…

"Domino's Pizza near Toride, Ibaraki." I said, frustrated. I looked over and saw that Sarah was giving me a look that said "I told you so".

"Shut up, it still works fine." I said.

"Wha- as tha-" …And a lake…

"Pizza! I want it! Give me the number!" I nearly shouted.

"Ar- yo- in dan-" …And Tokyo Bay…

"JUST GIVE ME THE FUCKING NUMBER, DAMN IT!"

"Okay, I- ge- lice to yo- loca- ri- ay" …And the toilet, once…

"Look, if you don't give me the number, I'm gonna kill myself." I probably threaten to do that more than I should…

"Ar- yo- in so- sor- of cul-" …Okay, maybe more than once…

"Ich möchte die Nummer für Domino Pizza!" I said in agitation. "Did you understand that, honey?"

"Okay, I'm gon- put yo- on hol- whil- I cal- ATF be- ause the To- lice depar- ob- sly ca- han- thi- selves." …And I may have thrown it at my mother's head…

"Wait, what was that?" I said. "I heard ATF in there."

"Jus- ay on the li-" …And a train may have run over it…

"No, why are you calling ATF?" I asked, however she already put me on hold. "Damn it."

Sarah was still giving me that "I told you so" look.

"Okay, god damn it, I'll take your phones." I gave in.

"What do you say?" She said like a mother to a little kid.

"Thank you, Sarah." I said.

Not long after that, Hideyoshi came downstairs wondering why there were about seventy cop cars outside asking the Neo Nazi Cult to come out before "they did what they did in Waco".

* * *

After we were able to convince the police that we weren't a Neo Nazi Cult planning on committing a mass suicide (Which wasn't hard because ATF never showed and the Toride Police are stupid.) I went home to try and figure out my new phone. When I got there, it was early. My mother had probably just gone to bed, so I didn't need to worry about running into her.

I went into Ikuto's room. He was still asleep. I thought about just gently nudging him awake, but where's the fun in that?

"OH MY GOD!" I screamed. "IKUTO, WAKE UP! THE HOUSE IS ON FIRE! MOM'S DEAD!"

"WHAT?" He shouted, panicked and confused.

"Ha-ha, just kidding." I said.

"What?"

"Just kidding."

"Not cool, Marceline." He said putting his hand to his chest, probably to feel how fast his heart was beating.

"Oh what, did I scare you?" I couldn't stop laughing.

"Yes!" He snapped. "For Christ's sake, I thought I was gonna die!"

"Oh, you can live through a fire." I said dismissively.

"Christ…" He muttered as he put his head in his hands.

"Here." I said as I handed him the black iPhone Four.

"What's this?" He asked as he took the phone.

"Christmas present from Sarah." I said.

"This is why you woke me up?" He asked.

"Yep."

"This." He said. "You woke me up at five in the morning and made me think I was going to die… For this?"

"Yeah…" Now that I thought about it, it did seem kind of stupid.

"Fuck you, Marceline."

I deserved that.

* * *

It was two days before New Year's Eve. Hundreds upon thousands of people throughout Tokyo were bustling around, shopping, and enjoying the Christmas and New Year's displays for the last few days before they were to be taken down. Utau's song "Meikyuu BUTTERFLY" (Which I'm pretty sure translates to "Butterfly's Labyrinth".) was the soundtrack to all of this. It was playing in every store, on every iPod, on every radio station, and the music video was on every mega-sized television screen in a sixty kilometer radius. You know, if Easter wasn't pocketing ninety-eight percent of the song's sales, Utau would be loaded right now.

Utau, however, stood on top of the Easter Building, staring out into the distance. She was waiting for something…

…And that something came up the stairs behind her, hoping that she would still be pissed at him for not showing up on Christmas Eve.

"Ikuto." Utau said when she saw him. She quickly ran up to him. "Why didn't you come on Christmas Eve?" Some of the hurt was still in her voice, but she wasn't pissed at him. Ikuto stayed silent as she hugged him. "Come to the next concert. You have to."

* * *

The Easter Incorporated Concert hall was packed. You could hardly breathe once you walked into the lobby of the building. I'm surprised there wasn't a massive amount of deaths from carbon dioxide poisoning. There were lines that went out the building just for snacks alone. Never mind the thousands of people who were lining up at the box office for last minute tickets despite the concert being sold out. All of this you have Utau to thank for. Ninety-percent of the audience there that night had no interest in seeing any of the other artists. Not even the boy band DARTS, which had been the hottest thing before Utau came along. All of these people just wanted to hear Utau sing.

Ikuto would have been extremely happy for her, if she wasn't doing it for the wrong reasons.

"You should hurry up and realize you're the reason she's falling to the dark side."

Ikuto couldn't help but remember what Nikaidou said while he stared at a poster of Utau hanging up on the wall. This was everything Utau had ever wanted; to be able to sing for thousands upon thousands of people. She had wanted to reach people's hearts with her songs. Now she was doing it, but for all the wrong reasons.

Ikuto shut his eyes and took a deep breath before walking to the meeting place. Going in there angry wouldn't help anything. Going in there pissed was just fine; going in there ready to slap a bitch would make matters ten times worse than they already were.

* * *

"Hello there, Ikuto-kun." Yukari pleasantly greeted. "I haven't seen you in a while. I heard you attacked a number of street performers on Christmas Eve and took their X-Eggs?"

"Yes." Nikaidou, who was standing a few steps to the front and left of Ikuto said. "But I was really behind it. And as usual I had him clean up the mess."

"I've heard that you've only found worthless X-Eggs, even after targeting those Seiyo Elementary Kids." Yukari said to Nikaidou.

"In any case," Director Hoshina, who was standing behind Yukari, said. "we must devote all of Easter's resources to finding the Embryo. I have great expectations for tonight."

Ikuto just stayed silent and stood there. He couldn't care less about what any of these people had to say. He'd still leave there hating them, hating life, and hating the world. None of this shit was fair, but he had no control over it.

"Hey. What are you doing?" Some crew member said off in the distance. "This area is for authorized personnel only."

"I-I'm so sorry!" That voice sounded familiar. Ikuto turned to look in the direction the voices were coming from for a second.

"Is something wrong?" Yukari asked.

"No." Ikuto said, still looking in that direction.

* * *

Amu finally walked out of that never-ending line with two ice creams in hand.

"Phew, I finally got it." She said to herself.

_How did I let Yaya talk me into buying ice cream? _Amu internally wondered. She began to look around for her friends but found that they weren't anywhere in sight.

"Huh?" She said. "Where did everyone go? Or wait, am I lost?" Lost? She couldn't be lost! The place was bigger than Gillette Stadium and Patriots' Place combined and was packed with people! How could she get lost? She began quickly looking around for familiar faces and found one rather quickly. Though, it didn't belong to any of her friends.

_Ikuto. _She thought. Ikuto was staring at a poster of Hoshina Utau before he just suddenly began to walk away. Amu realized that this might be her one chance to confront him and find out if he was the one making all the X-Eggs.

_I'll just ask him straight out_ _about Christmas night and about Easter._ She then followed him down a hallway and into some sort of storage/stage prep area. However, she didn't see where he went after that.

_I thought he went this way._

"Hello there, Ikuto-kun." She heard a woman say. She followed the direction of the voice and saw between a space between two boxes where Ikuto was. She couldn't see the woman who was talking or anyone else who happened to be there.

"I haven't seen you in a while." The woman continued as Amu hid behind a wall.

_Who did that voice belong to?_

"I heard you attacked a number of street performers on Christmas Eve and took their X-Eggs?"

"Yes." She heard a male voice say. "But I was really behind it." Then some crew member walked by with a really loud, rattily cart with squeaky wheels, so if they said anything else, she didn't hear it.

"W-Was that Ikuto's voice?" She whispered to herself. "I couldn't hear very clearly."

"I've heard that you've only found worthless X-Eggs, even after targeting those Seiyo Elementary Kids." The woman said.

Amu was shocked to hear that for a few seconds, but the shock quickly turned to anger.

"In any case," A man that was clearly not Ikuto said. "we must devote all of Easter's resources to finding the Embryo. I have great expectations for tonight."

_How many are there? Are they all with Easter? _ Amu thought. I hope to Super God that she wasn't planning on rushing in there. She'd probably get killed right on the spot. Then they'd make me cover it up. Ulgh. I don't wanna clean that mess up!

Luckily for me, a crew member happened to pass by then.

"Hey. What are you doing?" Some crew member said. "This area is for authorized personnel only."

"I-I'm so sorry!" All of that anger and rage and "fight or flight" shit immediately went out the window as Amu quickly changed her mind upon getting caught and quickly ran off to find her friends.

* * *

You wanna know who just made my People I Will Eternally Hate List? Nguyễn Hà Đông. Don't know who he is? He's the guy who created _Flappy Bird_, the most impossible, unwinnable game ever created! Sarah suggested I download it to my phone and boy do I regret it! I have been standing out here for nearly two hours trying to get the damn bird through the first obstacle and every time I die! It's so frustrating! I've almost thrown my nice, brand new phone on the ground six times now. I'd stop playing, but it's the only game I have on my phone. So it's pretty much play this frustrating game or sit on the ground bored.

What might I be doing that's so boring I require entertainment from a mobile device? Well, that's easy! I don't know. The Director just told me to stand in front of this door way to a storage/stage prep area and told me not to let anyone who wasn't Yukari, Nikaidou, Ikuto, or a crew member in. Which I found strange and questioned why I had to, but the Director just told me to follow orders with the "or else" implied. Seeing as this was a very pointless job, I just decided to entertain myself with this piece of crap iPhone game.

Okay, I guess my job was to guard the door, but what was going on that required me to guard it? The reason why I'm so concerned about this is because the last time they told me to guard something, I inexplicably began going through puberty at the age of nine and when I went to the doctor about this, I was told I might develop something really, really bad like Leukemia or Lou Gehrig's Disease later on in life and that I'm probably not gonna be able to bear children. (Not that I'm crying over that last thing.) So, you can understand why I was concerned. I still don't know what I was exposed to, last time. All I know is that it was somewhere in the middle of Russia and all the animals I saw there looked funny.

After the six millionth time I died, I finally gave up on the stupid game and contented myself to sitting on the ground, bored. Just as I decided that, however, I heard a crew member ask someone what they were doing back there, and heard a frightened girl say "I-I'm sorry!" before running in my direction.

_Oh shit!_ I thought. _I let someone slip by!_ Saw the girl turn the corner and go right past me.

"Halt!" I shouted. The girl immediately came to a stop. Surprisingly without tripping or dropping her ice cream. "Dreh dich um."

"What?" The girl said.

_Oh shit, I'm thinking in German again…_

"Turn around." I said again, this time in the correct language. The girl turned around and I recognized her. "Hello, Amu."

"H-how do you know me?" She asked, she was obviously shaken by getting caught. It was also apparent she didn't recognize me. It's understandable, though. I mean, we only talked for about twenty seconds on the street and it was incredibly awkward.

"I'm Shady." I said. "You know, the girl you had an incredibly awkward encounter with a couple weeks ago."

She looked confused for a second as she tried to rack her brain to find such an encounter stored somewhere within her memory banks. Her face light up when she remembered, though.

"Oh." She said. "Now I remember."

"Good." I said. "Now, tell me, what was going on back there?"

"I-I-I swear I wasn't doing anything wrong!" She said going back into panic mode. "I just got lost! I was looking for my friends!"

"Calm down!" I said. "You're not in trouble. I just wanna know what they were talking about or doing or whatever."

"What?" She said. "That's all?"

"Yeah." I said. "That's all."

"Well, why should I tell you?" I hate when people pull that kind of shit.

"Because if they were doing something really, really bad and I get something scary like Lou Gehrig's disease, I'm gonna give it to you." Yes, I know that's a threat of medical terrorism and is extremely illegal, but I wouldn't actually do it. There are at least ten people I'd like to give this disease to before her, like Director Hoshina, Logan, Kim Jong Un, Hitler if those conspiracy theorists are right…

"What's Lou Gehrig's Disease?" Amu asked.

"Just know that the baseball player it's named after is dead now." I said. "And he suffered for a very long time before he died."

That obviously scared her enough to tell me.

"A-alright." She said. "I overheard them talking about taking X-Eggs from children."

"…" I just stood there incredulously. "What the hell does that mean?"

"What?" Amu asked.

"Can I die from that?" I asked. "What does it do? Or wait, is it a code?"

"Um…" Amu said. "I don't think you can di-"

"Oh shit, I can't die yet!" I started panicking. "I was planning on going all-out when I turned twenty-five and either dying from a drug overdose, in a night club shooting, or suicide via cop!"

"That's…" She said clearly disturbed. "That's horrible!"

"I know, right! Now I'll never reach my life goals!"

"N-no I meant that…" Then she thought about it. "Never mind."

"Oh god, I don't wanna die like this!"

"R-relax." Amu said obviously not knowing how to deal with this. "I know for a fact that it's not a code and you're not gonna die."

"I'm not gonna die?"

"You're not gonna die." For some reason I felt relieved hearing that. But then it occurred to me…

"How do you know that?" I asked.

"Oh… Um…" Since it was obvious to Amu that I did not have a Guardian Character and did not know what X-Eggs were, she had trouble coming up with a logical explanation as to how she knew that I wouldn't die. I, however, thought that she had something that she either didn't want to tell me or couldn't tell me. I decided to just let it go. If someone doesn't want to tell me something or can't tell me something, I'm not gonna force it out of them unless it threatens myself or someone around me. Since I had been assured that I wasn't going to die and I had very good reason to believe she wasn't lying, I was under no threat.

"Fine then." I said. "Don't tell me. But," I quickly took the two melting ice creams out of her hands. "I'll be taking these."

"What?" She said confused for a second. "Hey! I paid for those with my own money!"

"And clearly you weren't gonna eat them as they were melting in your hands." I pointed out as I began walking away. "You know, there are starving children in Africa who would love to have just one lick of this!"

For a second, Amu just stood there furious that she was gonna have to get back in line and get two more ice creams for Yaya. What made the whole thing worse was that by the time that she had finally found her friends, the ice creams had melted again.

Yes, I know I'm a bitch.

* * *

The show was going to begin in a few minutes. The hundreds upon thousands of people who came to hear Utau sing were revved up and screaming at the top of their lungs. You could hear all the noise from hundreds of miles away. Seriously, people in Siberia were complaining about it.

"Let's go, Utau." Yukari said. Utau didn't move or say anything. She just stared at her reflection in the mirror. "Utau?"

"I quit." Utau said.

"What?" This was sudden.

"I'm not singing tonight." Utau said. "Sanjo-san, I agreed to look for the Embryo. But I don't want to be singing for that purpose." YES! THE GIRL HAS FINALLY SEEN THE LIGHT!

However, Yukari had an ace up her sleeve.

"So what?" Yukari said. "I already told you. You're obligated by contract to work for Easter. You and Ikuto-kun can no longer escape their grasp. You're like birds in a cage. Or would I rather call you butterflies? Honestly. I would've scouted a different girl if I'd known this would happen." Oh-no, here it comes. "That girl with three Guardian Characters. I believe her name was Hinamori Amu."

Utau stood up, having turned away for the light. I wish I hadn't spoken so soon…

"I won't lose." Utau said. "I won't lose to her."

She then began marching towards the stage to embrace the darkness.

* * *

Ikuto was going to see Utau before her concert like he promised. However, he heard everything Yukari said and heard Utau's promise not to be beaten by Amu. It was official. She had completely turned to the dark side for him.

* * *

Amu and her friends were sitting in their seats, among the thousands of cheering fans. So many people were cheering that it was hard to hear the music. Once people realized the song had started playing, they quieted a bit, but not much.

Suddenly, a spotlight landed center stage, and Utau began singing.

_"Open your shiny eyes in the silent night_

_Fushigi na yoru maiorita_

_Ashioto tatezu shinobiyoru_

_nayamashi ge na kuro neko no POOZU_

_Tsuki akari wo se ni ukabu SHIRUETTO_

_kocchi e oide to hohoende temaneki_

_Yokubou no kage ugomeku machi_

_Tenshi no furi de samayoi_

_Taisetsu sou ni kakaeteru_

_Ikiba no nai ai no kakera_

_Nemuri ni tsuku koro anata mo dokoka de_

_Shiawase na yume o mite iru no_

_Hoshizora ni KISU o shite ii ko wa mou oyasumi"_

Suddenly, black bat wings sprouted from Utau's back. And no, It wasn't part of the outfit she was wearing. That'd be impossible. It had an open back.

"Huh? Wings?" Amu wondered if it was part of the performance.

_"Mitsumenaide tsukamaenaide_

_Mayoikonda BATAFURAI_

_Jiyuu utau dare ni mo mienai hane"_

"It's about to start." Yukari said to the director from back stage.

* * *

Ikuto was still contemplating what heard Yukari say and what Nikaidou had told him before.

"That girl would do anything for you. She'd even choose to do very bad things."

_It's too late, isn't it?_ He thought.

* * *

_"Kakushiteru no anata no mune no oku"_ Utau sang as she pointed to the audience. Suddenly, the eggs of four of her fans appeared in the air.

_"Kagami no naka no omokage wa" _She continued as if there was nothing horribly wrong happening.

_"Nakimushi datta ano koro_

_Dakeredomou kodomo ja nai_

_Nobashita kami wo hodoita"_

Other people, however, noticed.

"No way!" Amu said in shock as she looked up at the eggs. "Are those…"

"Heart's Eggs?" Yaya finished.

"For real?!" Kukai said.

"In a place like this?" Tadase said.

They were in disbelief. They shouldn't be. This **is** an Easter event. Those always end badly. Like that time they had that dinner party and all of their top executives got drunk and started saying Anti-Semitic things and members of the Associated Press were there and called them out on it. That was probably the funniest thing that aired on NHN all year.

"_Mune wo shimetsukeru amai FUREGURANSU_

_Yuuwaku shiteru kizuite iro_

_Kotoba wo nakushita kuchibiru ni mahou kaketa no"_

"Utau's singing has a magic-like power." Yukari explained to the Director. "It causes children to have big dreams, leaving their hearts defenseless and making it easier to take their eggs." She smiled inwardly at her "sure not to fail" plan. "Well, will the Embryo be among today's eggs? If not, they'll just be garbage."

"_Mitsumenaide tsukamaenaide_

_Mayoikonda BATAFURAI_

_Itoshi sugi-"_

**SLAM!**

A light had suddenly and inexplicably fallen from the scaffolding and slammed a few feet from Utau. The music was immediately cut, the house lights came on, and everyone started to become confused as to what was going on.

**CRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAASH!**

The entire scaffolding system fell right onto the stage. Utau had been ushered off the stage as soon as the first light had fallen, so she didn't get hurt but it was pretty obvious the show wasn't going to continue.

People, in confusion and fear, began running and trampling each other to get out. So many people were trying to get out that the exits became blocked with bodies. Ah, the mob mentality, don't you love it? It didn't help that some idiot installed the doors so that way they opened on the inside of the theater, not the outside. To make matters even worse, someone felt it was necessary to shout "**OH MY GOD! IT'S AL-QAEDA!**" in a crowd full of panicked, fearful people.

Yes, I know I'm a bitch.

* * *

Yukari and Utau stood off to the side of the stage as pretty much everyone else was racing for dear life to the exits because they thought they were going to die by the hands of Al-Qaeda. The watched as the four eggs overhead turned to X-Eggs.

"What a shame." Yukari said. "I guess none of them were the Embryo. Utau, let's go."

Utau just looked away from the X-Eggs, feeling a mixture of slight shame and disappointment.

* * *

Ikuto stood on the roof of the concert hall Character Changed while watching as people slowly trickled out of the building. A lot of them were bruised and bloodied and saying something about this being a terrorist attack by Al-Qaeda. (Which Ikuto didn't find believable as Al-Qaeda didn't have any sort of beef with Japan.)

Yoru was floating next to him, sniffing the air for the scent of the X-Eggs.

"I smell X-Eggs!" He exclaimed once he picked up the scent. "Let's hurry, Ikuto! If we don't deal with them soon, we're gonna have one big mess-nya."

"I know." Ikuto said just before jumping down from the roof.

* * *

Amu was one of the lucky few that had made it out of the theater before the bodies started piling up. Her friends had made it out, too, but they were inside the hall's main lobby looking for her. Amu was somewhere outside the hall. She didn't see any other people around, so she assumed she ran somewhere around the side or back of the hall.

"Wh-what happened?" She wondered aloud. "I got separated from everyone else. What should I do?" All of a sudden she got a bad, sinking feeling. "What's this feeling?" She turned around and saw the four X-Eggs from earlier floating there.

"X-Eggs?!" She exclaimed. "Are they the ones from earlier?" No, someone else just decided to rip the hearts eggs out of children. What do you think?

One of the eggs began shaking and began to crack, revealing an X-Character that was trying to emerge.

"Meikyuu, Meikyuu Butterfly." It said ominously.

"What do I do?" Amu thought aloud. "Without my Guardian Characters, I can't Character Change or Chara Nari!"

Then all of a sudden, out of nowhere, Ikuto suddenly jumped up in the air and Chara Naried with Yoru to become Black Lynx. His school uniform (Which I don't know why he was wearing because he hadn't had school for the past week.) was replaced with a short, navy top with a silver cross attached to it and long navy pants. He wore also wore long, handless gloves with sharp, Wolverine-like claws attached to them. The Dumpty Key was chained around his right wrist and he had the usual cat ears and tail he had when he Character Changed.

Alright, totally off topic here, but minus the key and the ears and the tail and the Wolverine Claws, doesn't Ikuto's outfit sound like something a male stripper would wear? I mean seriously! What the fuck? Does he have some secret sexual perversion that he's not telling us about? Christ!

As he landed on the ground, he scooped up the X-Egg and the X-Character inside. Amu looked on awestruck.

_Did he Chara Nari?_ She thought. No, he just woke up this morning and decided to run around dressed like a male stripper. What do you think?

Ikuto squeezed the egg so that way it closed, trapping the X-Character inside.

"What are you going to do with that egg?" Amu demanded to know. "Tell me! Were you the one who turned them into X-Eggs? Yuki-chan, Yamada-kun, and Maika-chan… All of their eggs…"

Ikuto said nothing.

"Did you!?"

The egg being crushed into a million pieces was his only response.

"Th-the egg was…" Ran said as she and the other Guardian Characters arrived.

"How could he?" Kiseki, Tadase's Guardian Character, said.

"Amu-chan!" Ran exclaimed as she Miki, and Su floated up to their owner.

"The egg…" Amu said softly in shock. "What's going to happen to its owner and the Character inside."

Just then, the apparent owner of the egg happened to pass by with either his mother.

"I've always known it's impossible to become a singer, realistically speaking." He said.

"Just so you know…" Ikuto finally said. "Even without my help, most people break unneeded eggs. That's what happened to all the adults walking around with tired looks on their faces. They've long abandoned the egg holding who they wanted to be."

"No…" Amu said. She began feeling all of that anger and rage from before building up inside her again. "It really was you. You did all of it." Ikuto turned so he wasn't facing her. "I hate you!" She shouted. "I **hate** you!"

Ikuto didn't say anything. He just stood there and took it.

All of Amu's friends decided to show up then.

"Tsukiyomi Ikuto!" Tadase exclaimed when he saw Ikuto there. (Apparently he still has sand in his vagina over whatever happened between the two of them. I don't know.)

"Look! Look!" Yaya exclaimed. "X-Eggs!" She pointed over the three other eggs that had begun to hatch as well.

"Meikyuu, Meikyuu Butterfly!" All three said ominously.

"Amu-chan!" Ran exclaimed, indicating that Amu should Chara Nari as well.

"Right!" Amu said. "My own heart, unlock!"

And with those words, she began her transformation into the pink cheerleader, Amulet heart. Upon seeing her, the X-Characters went back into their eggs and tried to fly away.

"Amu-chan, they're getting away!" Miki exclaimed.

"I know." She said and she quickly sprang into action. "Negative Heart!" She shouted as she made a heart shape with her hands around the lock. "Lock on!" Just then beams of energy came out of the lock and surrounded the X-Eggs. "Open Heart!" And with that, the X-Eggs returned to normal and flew off to find their owners. Amu looked on as the eggs flew off, but quickly turned her attention back to Ikuto.

"I've made up my mind." She said. "I won't let you win!"

"Hinamori-san." Tadase said as he and the others moved closer.

"If Easter puts X's on everyone's eggs," Amu said. "then I'll cleanse them all!"

With that, Ikuto decided it probably a good idea to jump away and disappear into the night.

* * *

When I got home, it was the crack of dawn. It took me awhile to get out of the theater seeing as bodies had started piling up in the doors and the big guys that were hired to protect everyone who was preforming that night wouldn't let anyone go out the back door. (This is dangerous, given the situation.) Even though I had been up since five a.m. the previous day, I didn't feel tired. I blame the excitement of the panic and the fact that I drank about five Red Bulls at the concert.

Once I got home, I went upstairs to make sure Ikuto got out alive. He did, thank god. He had apparently collapsed from exhaustion. I don't blame him. So much went on last night. He didn't even make an effort to even pull the covers over himself, so I got an extra blanket off the foot of the bed and threw it over him. I glanced at his face for a second. Though most of it was buried into the pillow, the tiny portion of it that I could see looked like it was wet with tears. I thought about waking him up and asking him what was wrong, but decided against it as I would probably get nowhere and make the situation worse. So, I left the room without saying anything.

After that, I went in my room, got in my jammies and continued where I left off on an episode of _South Park_.

Karen McCormick sat in bed crying because she had been separated from her parents and put into foster care. Just then, the shadow of a figure came over her and she stopped when she noticed.

"Huh?" She said. "Oh, it's you." She smiled at the figure. It was her brother, Kenny, as his superhero identity Mysterion crouched in the window. However, as far as she knew, it was her "Guardian Angel". "I was wondering when you'd appear. You always come when I'm sad."

"You are going to be okay, Karen!" Mysterion assured her. "You have to keep believing that!"

"Why did my mommy and daddy go to jail?" She asked.

Mysterion thought about it for a second and then said: "Sometimes, people do stupid things. Sometimes they don't realize what should have come first. Until it's too late."

"But I'm all alone now."

"You are not alone." Mysterion said. "No matter where you go, no matter what you do, I will always be here! Do you understand?"

"I'll try, Guardian Angel."

"Don't try, Karen. Do."

* * *

**The reason why I was excited about an "L" being in the title because on the Word Document I have this all saved on the chapter titles are written in the same font L uses for his L. I'm probably not making any sense and look weird... Oh, well.**

**So this is my longest chapter yet! Over five-thousand words and eleven pages! Oh, god! I'm just happy to be done! Now I can move on to the next chapter! :)**

**Thank you to x.x.x.-Shizuko Katsuyuki-x.x.x for reviewing and following! :)**

* * *

**This was originally uploaded to the Hi no Nami Blogspot on 3/13/14**


	17. Chicka Chicka Slim Shady

**_South Park _is gonna sue me!**

**"My Name is" by Eminem**

* * *

"Marceline."

"Mn…"

"Marceline."

"Ngh…"

"Wake up, motherfucker."

"Agh… Shut up, Mom! I'm tryn' to sleep."

"I'm not your mother, dumb ass."

"Well, whoever the fuck you are, shut up! I'm trying to sleep!"

"Don't tell me to shut up."

"Oh, I can tell you whatever the fuck I want! You're just a voice! You can't hurt me!"

"Oh, you think I can hurt you?"

"Yeah."

"Well, how do you like this?"

And then my head exploded, sending pieces of brains, skull, and blood everywhere.

* * *

I woke up sprawled out on the floor of my bedroom with the DVD menu on the screen. I must have fallen asleep while watching _South Park_. I sat up and looked around. The clock on my wall read noon. Great, I didn't waste my whole day. I got up, took a shower in my bathroom and got dressed.

I went downstairs to get myself something to eat. Maybe a Pop Tart or something? I wasn't sure. When I got to the bottom of the stairs I saw Ikuto sitting on the couch watching some Anime. I forget the name of it, but it had something to do with robots coming out of a kid's head.

"Hey." I said walking over to him. "Happy Twenty-thirty-nine."

"Happy twenty-thirty-nine." He said, keeping his eyes on the screen.

"Wha'cha watchin'?" I asked.

"_Fooly Cooly_." He said.

"Oh." I said. "Can I watch, too?"

"Why?" He asked.

"What do you mean why?"

"You hate Anime."

"What? No, I don't."

"Yeah, you do."

"When did I say that?"

"A few months ago you watched _Bleach_ with me and you said it was 'the most fucking retarded show you've ever seen'." Oh. That is true. I did say that.

"Oh, come on! That was just one Anime."

"When you watched _One Piece _with me you kept complaining about how the show made no sense, even though I told you multiple times that you had to watch from the beginning to get it." I don't remember watching that, though. I might have been drunk…

"Well, then I guess I shouldn't have watched that one then if it's so confusing." I said. "Just because those two sucked doesn't mean I hate all Anime."

"When you watched _Naruto_ you screamed: 'That's it! I'm giving up on this entertainment platform! If someone can come up with something as shitty as this I don't wanna watch anything similar or having to do with this!' For which I don't blame you. _Naruto _is a pretty shitty Anime. But still…"

"Alright!" I said. "I get it! I haven't liked all the Anime I've seen in the past but maybe I'll like this one!"

"Is there something wrong?" Ikuto asked.

"No." I said. "Why?"

"'Cause you're pretty insistent on watching this with me." He said. "Is this our last day on Earth or something?"

"Oh, come on!" I said. "Why do you automatically assume it's the last day on earth if I just wanna watch some stupid Anime with you?"

"Because you wanna watch some stupid Anime with me."

"Nothing's wrong." I said.

"You sure?"

"Yeah."

"Alright, fine then." He said while he scooted over on the couch to make room for me. I sat down and actually legitimately tried to watch the show…

For five seconds. I was immediately lost as to what was going on. Some pink-haired girl was going through someone's draws and said something about respecting the privacy of others. What the hell? If you think you should be respecting the privacy of others, don't go through their draws, you idiot! Why was she going through that person's draws anyway? And then for some reason some cuff or whatever she had on started jingling or shaking or whatever, then it cut to a girl covering her ears and saying she was going to overflow. Then the girl fell on the ground and something weird started happening to the boy she was with. A nearby building started lighting up and the boy looked like he was experiencing a really bad headache. Then something burst out of his head… It was a robot.

_Okay! _I thought._ That's it! I give up! I'm completely lost! I'm not able to follow this anymore!_

I turned my attention away from the screen and looked at Ikuto. He was just expressionlessly staring at the screen, watching the show. I was looking for any sign that something was wrong with him. I was fairly certain that he had been crying the night before and if I asked him about it, he'd deny the allegations. He's not the type to share what's bothering him. I remember a few years ago he got appendicitis and kept insisting that he was fine and nothing was wrong until his appendix actually burst, he contracted sepsis and nearly died. (I should note that my mother did notice the symptoms, but believed him when he said he was fine and didn't push the matter any farther. I still hold this against her.)

After a few minutes, Ikuto noticed my staring.

"Alright, something's up." He said.

"What?" I said. "Nothing's wrong."

"Then why do you keep staring at me?"

"I don't know." I said. "You look hotter than you usually do today?" He gave me a weird look.

"That's disturbing, Marceline." He said.

"Wouldn't be me if I wasn't disturbing." I said.

"Marceline." He said.

"Ikuto." I said. He sighed.

"Look, if I gave you two-thousand yen, would you leave me alone?" He asked.

"Two-thousand yen?" I asked in disbelief. "Where did you get that kind of money?"

"Found it on the street yesterday." He simply said. It was pretty apparent that he didn't think anything of it.

"Isn't that stealing?" I asked. I had to use the word stealing to monitor his reaction. If he was lying, he'd just outright deny it. If he was telling the truth, he'd just ask me if I wanted the money.

"Do you want it?" He asked.

"Yes, please." I said.

* * *

I ended up just going to a movie. I saw _300: Rise of an Empire_. All I have to say about that movie is that if you saw the first one, you know what to expect. I had a lot of candy left over from the movie. Although tickets cost one-thousand, one-hundred yen, I saved all that money by sneaking in the theater through the emergency exit door. It was actually surprising to me that someone could get in there that way. I thought after what happened in Colorado, they'd start blocking those doors, but no.

I knew there was gonna be no way I'd finish all of that candy by myself, so I went to Nashi's house where I knew everyone would be.

"Hey guys!" I said as I jumped into the basement. "Guess what I have?"

"A puppy!" Akiko excitedly guessed.

"Oh, Christ, no!" I said. "I'm not cruel enough to bring a defenseless animal down here for Kimura to beat."

"HEY!" Kimura shouted.

"No, I actually have, drum roll please…" Silence. "I said drum roll, please!"

"There aren't any drums here, you dumb whore." Kimura said.

"I know that!" I retorted. "Just go duh-da-da-da-da-da-da-da until I unveil it!"

"That's retarded!" With that, Sarah kicked Kimura. "OW! THAT HURT YOU FUCKING WHORE! OW!" My fist collided with the back of his skull.

"Don't call my best friend a whore, jackass!" I said.

"FUCK THIS!" Kimura shouted. "I DON'T HAVE TO TAKE THIS!" And then he got up and left.

"Alright…" I said. "Now that he's gone, drum roll please!"

"Do we really have to?" Shizuka asked.

"Yes." I said. "Now, drum roll please!" Everyone collectively sighed.

**Duh-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da…**

"FREE CANDY!" I shouted.

There was silence.

"Candy?" Minami said.

"Y… Yeah…" I said. "That… That isn't awesome?"

"No, it's not." Akiko said.

"Why not?" I asked a little sadly.

"Because we're not five." Shizuka said. "The most a candy bar costs is like… What? Two-hundred yen? That's nothing. Now if you came down here and said free beer, that'd be a different story."

"Come on!" I said. "Nothing tastes better than free candy!"

"What about five-finger discount candy?" Sarah asked.

"…Okay, that is pretty good." I admitted.

"And five-finger discount beer?" Akiko asked.

"Well, once you get past the burn of the alcohol it's pretty good." I said.

"And five-finger discount sex?" Minami asked.

"What's five-finger discount sex?" I asked.

"It's where you have sex with a prostitute and don't pay her." Minami explained.

"Isn't that kind of rape?" I asked.

"Not if she doesn't ask for the money up front." Minami said.

"Okay, I get it." I said as I collapsed on to the couch next to Sarah. "It was stupid of me to bring free candy instead of free beer. I'll remember that next time."

"Can we still have the candy?" Chouko asked. Her eyes gave me a look that said "please, sir, I want some more". That's right. Chouko only eats when someone brings food over here.

"You can have the entire bag if you want." I said reaching across the table to hand the food over to her. "I'm fairly certain that if I eat any more sugar, my breakfast will make a reappearance." Yup, no one wants to see the _Kit Kat_, _Sour Patch Kids_, and liter and a half of _Pepsi_ that my breakfast consisted of.

"Thank you!" Chouko said extremely grateful for the food.

"By the way, where did you get all that candy?" Sarah asks. "Did a guy in a windowless van give it to you?"

"No." I said. "My brother gave me two-thousand yen to get out of the house."

"So had two-thousand yen and instead of buying beer you got twenty pounds of candy?" Sarah asked incredulously.

"All I'd be able to buy with that much money is a six pack." I said. "Besides, I look too young. They'd never sell to me."

Two things I'd like to point out here. The first thing is-and I know this is off topic-I don't know why people complain about the high price of cigarettes when the price of beer is much higher. If the price of a six-pack of beer is two-thousand yen and the price of a ten pack of cigarettes is one-thousand yen. That means one beer in a six pack is worth about three-hundred yen while one cigarette in a ten pack is worth one-hundred yen. That pisses me off. Cigarettes are worse for you in my opinion because they cause a plethora of cancers. The worst I'm aware that alcohol can do to you is damage your liver and cause you to make horrible decisions while operating a motor vehicle. Livers and cars are replaceable. Lungs and lymph nodes are irreplaceable. That's why I don't understand why the price of alcohol is so high.

Two, the fact that no one would ever sell alcohol to me isn't that much of a shock. I mean, while everyone here thinks I'm seventeen, I am truly eleven years old. The only reason why I think everyone here believes my claim that I am seventeen is because I act older than my age. If you don't believe that, then I'll ask you how many eleven-year-olds do you know that use the words "shit" and "fuck" as much as I do and have the same amount of sexual knowledge that I have? If a name came to your mind I feel sorry for you. Oh, it also might help my case on my age that I have four tattoos and more scars than I can count.

I sat there for a few seconds, thinking about nothing in particular when I remember something.

"Hey wait!" I said. "Akiko gave you guys free chocolate and you guys were all for it."

Then the room went silent again.

"Shady, have you even had the chocolate yet?" Shizuka asked.

"No." I said. "Why?"

"Uh, well…" Akiko said. "I made it myself and there's kind of a …special ingredient… in the chocolate."

"Special ingredient?" I repeated. Oh dear lord, please don't let it be pot! Not only can I not get high off of that stuff, but it makes everything smell like a skunk and tastes horrible when eaten. If she gave me pot laced chocolate, I'm gonna be pissed. Luckily, Sarah elaborated on what the secret ingredient was.

"It's X." She said. Oh, thank god it was only X.

For those of you who aren't as street savvy as us, X is short for XTC, otherwise known as ecstasy or methylenedioxy-n-methylamphetamine (MDMA). It's a psychedelic amphetamine that causes you to feel extremely connected and empathetic towards others. Although it is most frequently sold as tablets, you can also get them in capsules or in powdered form. It was invented sometime in nineteen-ninety-six by Dr. Gerald Ya Ya and his partner Dave. The worst thing that can happen to you if you take the drug is that if you take too much your back could start resembling the McDondald's Arches and you'll experience a seizure. Don't worry, you'll be fine as long as you live close to a hospital and you're friends aren't stupid enough to just watch and laugh as you slowly die on the floor.

I do admit to taking this drug several times in the past. The only reason I can give to justify my use of it is that it took away all the negative emotions such as anger, depression, and anxiety and made me feel… I can't really describe what I felt… I suppose euphoric would be the correct word to use, but such a description feels weak compared to what I really felt. Now that I do think about it, I don't think that any words can describe the effect that X had on me. It was just that good.

Of course, I'm not encouraging or promoting that anyone should go out and do this. If you take certain kinds of X like Molly (Which is pure MDMA.) you run the risk of overdosing faster than Amy Winehouse and if you do go out and decide to do drugs because of what I've just said and you O.D., they're gonna come for me and I'm gonna have to grow a goatee and get a disguise and hide 'cause it'll be my fault. So don't do drugs and do exactly as I don't 'cause I'm bad for you.

"Oh." Was all I said before allowing the topic to change to something different.

After about an hour Suzuki came down and shouted free beer which everyone went crazy over and made me feel even more like an idiot. I guess I shouldn't be surprised that I drank half the twenty-four pack and can no longer remember what happened between then and the next day.

* * *

On Monday, January Third, Twenty-thirty-nine, millions of workers across Japan returned to work. The over seven-thousand people who worked in Easter's main international headquarters were in for a shock, though. Their place of business had been very extremely vandalized. Toilet paper hung from the trees, windows were broken, and it looked like someone even did a drive-by with a paintball gun. The inside as much worse. There was broken glass everywhere, paintings and photos were torn from the wall, the computers at the receptionists' desk/help center were smashed, a plant was pulled out of its pot and thrown across the room, and a giant big screen TV that was positioned on the wall behind reception was shattered. Although no one knew who did it, there was a big hint written on one of the walls in the back of the extremely large room.

On the walls, the kanji for "Satsujin-sha!" or "Murderers!" was written on the walls in red spray paint. Underneath it, a name was signed.

That name was Slim Shady.

* * *

**Eminem'll probably sue me, too.**

**Nothing I can really say about this chapter. I put a lot of filler in there because I wasn't sure in what direction I wanted to take this, but I have it figured out now. **

**Oh, if you have time, look up the song "Cups" by Anna Kendrick. I don't know why but it's been stuck in my head all week.**

* * *

**This was originally uploaded to the Hi no Nami Blogspot on 3/22/14**


	18. The Real Slim Shady

**Everybody knows that you're just an asshole. Everywhere that you go, people wanna go "Oh, everyone knows". Everybody knows, so don't pretend to be nice. There's no place you can hide. You are just an asshole. Everyone knows, everyone knows.**

**"The Real Slim Shady" by Eminem**

* * *

If an atomic bomb went off in the middle of Tokyo right now, I think more people would be dead from coming face to face with Hoshina Kazuomi's rage than would be dead from the explosion. This was a serious blow to the company's reputation to have the main headquarters so severely vandalized. (I don't know how that would hurt the company's reputation. I mean, what does a vandalized building have to do with stocks and all that other bullshit? I don't know. The business world is weird.) If someone didn't pay for it fast, you can bet that I would be getting called to cover up something.

Director Hoshina sat behind his desk while he spoke with Koizumi Arata, Easter's Head of Security. Although he was wearing that unreadable expression that he always wore, it wasn't hard to guess that the Director was pissed more than he usually was.

"Security cameras did pick up several figures breaking into the building at around twenty-one hundred hours last night and leaving at oh-two hundred this morning." As Koizumi said that, his fearful moderate blue eyes dashed around the room. He was expecting to be shot in the head at any given moment. Koizumi was normally not such a coward, but given the fact that he was dealing with the Director of Easter-arguably the second most powerful man in the world-one can understand why he was airing on the side of caution when speaking to him.

"And?" Director Hoshina in that incomprehensible tone he always used.

"…And we were unable to identify any of the figures in the video." Koizumi fearfully admitted. "They had their faces covered and wore black from head to toe. We can't even tell how many there were due to the fact that the security cameras only film in low-quality black and white stills."

The Director stayed silent. Koizumi stayed silent as well, fearing that speaking when not directly spoken to would only land him in even hotter water. The silence was broken a few minutes later when the Director's personal assistant/secretary, Watanabe, came barging into the office without knocking.

"Sorry to interrupt, sir," The petite blonde woman said. "but Joel Lawrence from the London office is on the phone and he wants to know what's going on with the whole Crimea situation."

"Tell him what we told Mr. Petrov yesterday." The Director said.

"I did and he said he wanted to speak with you directly." Watanabe explained. "…Something about being unable to justify six Russian Ambassadorial offices and none in the Ukraine."

"Fine." The Director said. "Patch him through to my personal line."

"Yes, sir." Watanabe said with a curt nod before returning to her desk down the hall.

"Koizumi-san, you're dismissed." The Director nearly ordered him to leave. Koizumi couldn't have been more relived to have gotten out of there alive. He, much like Watanabe, nodded curtly said something along the lines of "Yes, sir" before taking his leave.

Kazuomi briefly turned his attention to the Tokyo skyline before taking the call.

* * *

For once in my life, I had a dreamless sleep. I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing because it came along with the feeling that I was run over by a bus carrying the maximum capacity of obese people while I was asleep. I hadn't even fully opened my eyes yet and I had aches and sores all over my body. I tried shifting from lying on my left side to lying on my right and it felt like someone unleashed a rain of machinegun fire from the ceiling.

"Ow…" I groaned. To be honest, this isn't the worst I've ever felt, but it's definitely in the top one-hundred. I'm not gonna advise against going out and getting drunk ('Cause sometimes life just sucks so much that you need to go out and get flat out drunk.) but just know the consequences of your actions. If you start losing count of how many beers you drank, that's probably a red flag that you're gonna have a pretty damn bad hangover the next day. …And that you should probably give your keys to someone else… Preferably someone who isn't also drunk… Learned that one the hard way…

When I finally convinced myself to get out of bed, it seemed my stomach decided to make me feel worse by twisting in knots and forcing its contents upwards. I rushed into the bathroom and watched as the disgusting tasting liquid forced its way out of my mouth.

"Fuck." I muttered as I coughed up the last of it. "I am never getting drunk again."

* * *

"And now…" The announcer on the television said. "Channel Five News at Five with Tom Tucker and Diane Simmons." The screen quickly changed from some generic news graphic to Tom and Diane sitting at the news desk.

"Good evening." Diane Simmons, a woman with short brown hair and reddish-brown eyes said. "Breaking news tonight, still no news on what happened to that Malaysian Airlines jet, but we've brought a homeless person who claims to be psychic to tell us horrible things that **may** have happened to the flight."

"But first," Tom, a mustached man with brown hair and blue eyes said. "we have Asian reporter Tricia Takanawa with some bullshit story that we're putting on before our sensationalist story to keep you watching and keep our ratings high. Tricia."

They then cut to the only Asian reporter they had on their show despite the fact that this is Japan and nearly everyone on this fucking island is fucking Japanese. She was short, had short black hair, and brown eyes.

"Tom, I am standing in front of the International Easter Corporation Headquarters which has just been horribly vandalized." Tricia said. "It is unknown who carried out this criminal act, but police have video evidence." Then a few stills from the security camera footage came up on the screen, showing hooded figures frozen in mid-run. "They won't let us show the full video on television, however if you recognize anyone in these images, you've been asked to contact the Tokyo Metropolitan Police on their website or Crime Stoppers either by going to their website or calling 1-800-222-TIPS. That's 1-800-222-8477."

I burst out laughing. Once I had pretty much finished barfing up nearly my entire digestive system, I took a shower. I had just gotten out and was going into the kitchen to get myself a glass of water so I could take some aspirin for the hangover when I saw that on the TV in the living room.

_Oh, that's just fucking hilarious!_ I thought. _I can't wait to find out who the person who did that was so that way I can send them a personal thank you!_ It took a few minutes to collect myself again, only to immediately burst out into laughter due to the accusations the homeless guy was making. He seriously suggested that the plane went through a wormhole and ended up in another dimension! What the fuck? What is this, _The Langoliers_? This guy doesn't know what the fuck he's talking about! They're probably gonna find the damn plane somewhere in the ocean.

After a good twenty minutes of laughing so hard that I made my headache worse, I decide it's probably a good idea to get up off the floor and get myself some aspirin.

I get my aspirin and go back upstairs. I went in my room and was about to put on _South Park_ or _Family Guy_ or something when my phone started ringing.

"_Drop those titties on the floor_

_Drop those titties on the floor_

_Drop those tittes on the floor_

_On the floor_

_On the floor"_

I love that ringtone. Thank you Onision!

I pick up the phone and am immediately presented with the sound of a woman laughing and saying something in some other language. At least, I think it's another language. The loud music in the background makes it hard to tell.

"Who is this?" I ask.

"What?" The person on the other end of the line said.

"I asked who it is I'm speaking to." I said

"What?" They ask again.

"DAMN IT!" I shouted. "TURN THE GOD DAMN MUSIC DOWN!"

"Oh, sorry." They say and I hear the volume of the music go down.

"Thank you." I said. "Now, who is this?"

"Wow, don't you look at the caller ID?" I can't tell if they're being sarcastic or serious. "It's me. Sarah."

"Oh." I say. "Sorry, I didn't check the caller ID before I picked up."

"Eh." She says. "It's cool, dude. I do that all the time."

"Really?" I say. "Do you also call people while you have the stereo turned all the way up?"

"You know that stuff is like white noise to me." Sarah says. "I listen to it all the time. I sometimes don't even realize I have it on." Oh, yeah, that is true. "Are you okay? You're sound snappier than you usually are. Wait, let me guess, it's that time of the month."

"No!" I say defensively. I don't know why I found that embarrassing. Probably because I know that can't happen to me and if it does I've been instructed by some of the top medical officials in the country to stick a pistol in my mouth and pull the trigger. I'm still very suspicious as to what I was exposed to in Russia. "It's just probably the damn hangover."

"Aw." Sarah said in a little bit of (possibly feigned) sadness. "I was hoping for someone to be miserable with."

"Eh, well, too bad for you." I said. "Hey, why didn't you stop me last night? You know I can't handle more than five!"

"Lightweight." Sarah said.

"Sarah, I'm serious here!" I said. "I can't even remember anything that happened last night after I downed my sixth beer!"

"Hey, I'm not you're mother!" Sarah pointed out. "It's your own fault for drinking yourself so far under the table you can't remember you were under there!"

"What?" I said.

"Never mind." Sarah said. She sucks with analogies and shit like that.

"So," I say, fearing what I may hear. "what happened last night?"

"Wait," Sarah says. "You seriously can't remember?"

"Nope." I simply stated.

"You've gotta be kidding!" Sarah said in disbelief. "No one can forget a night like that, even if they were shitfaced through most of it!"

"What do you mean?" I ask. "What happened?"

"Oh…" Sarah said. "Where do I begin? Tell me, what's the last thing that you remember?"

"Um…" I said, trying to get a clear mental vision of the events of last night but getting nothing but static. Eventually, though, something fuzzy comes into view. "I think I might have been on my seventh beer… Suzuki said something about Lori Laughlin…"

"Oh yeah!" Sarah said while laughing. "You picked a funny place to start from, my friend.

* * *

Apparently we were talking about what celebrities from the eighties we'd like to fuck. Sarah said Patrick Swayze because all the dance training he got to prepare for _Dirty Dancing_ made him "as limber as fuck". Akiko said she'd fuck Jonathan Taylor Tomas, but when we informed her that he was from the nineties, not the eighties, she seemed confused and we let her skip the turn.

Suzuki was next and he said he'd fuck Lori Laughlin. I burst out laughing. I honestly couldn't believe he said that. I mean, yeah, in the eighties Lori Laughlin was very pretty, but she wasn't a PYT or anything. I'm pretty sure she was in her early thirties when she started working on _Full House_ and looked pretty average for her age. He insisted, however, that she was more than fuckable. So, I asked him what he would do if the version of Lori Laughlin that existed in nineteen-eighty-seven came bursting into the room and begged him to fuck her. He gave an amused laugh in response.

"I'd merely follow the teachings of one of my favorite psalms." He said.

"Oh yeah?" I said in a very slurred manner due to all the alcohol. "What's that?"

"It's a man's obligation to stick his boneration in a woman's separation." He said at a fast pace. "This kind of penetration increases the population of the younger generation."

"What?" I said with drunk laughter.

"It's a man's obligation to stick his boneration in a woman's separation." He repeated. "This kind of penetration increases the population of the younger generation."

I bust out into hysterical laughter. "Oh, Christ! Where did you learn that?"

"The Urban Dictionary." Of course.

"Oh my god…" I said, unable to catch my breath from the laughter. "You have got to teach me that. How'd it go again?"

"Okay." He said. "It goes: It's a man's obligation to stick his boneration in a woman's separation. This kind of penetration increases the population of the younger generation." For some reason, hearing it slower made me laugh so hard I dropped my beer on the floor, causing the contents of the can to spill on the rug. Sarah, who was sitting next to me and trying to suppress her laughter (She was sober enough to realize how immature this was, but not sober enough to think of it as not being funny.) as she picked the can up off the floor for me and put it on the coffee table.

"Thanks." I said though my laughter.

"No problem." She said while trying to suppress her own.

Shizuka looked at us with a weird expression.

"You guys are so immature." She said.

"Oh, shut up, Shizuka." Sarah said.

"Yeah." I said. "Shut the fuck up. You don't know nuthin'. …'bout anythin'." I laughed. "Now it goes 'It's a man's obligation to stick his boneration in a woman's oper-'"

"No, separation." Suzuki corrected. "It's a man's obligation to stick his boneration in a woman's separation. This kind of penetration will increase the population of the younger generation."

"Oh." I said. "It's a man's obligation to stick his boneration in a woman's separation to increase the population of the younger generation."

"No, you skipped a line." Suzuki corrected again. "The second part is: This kind of penetration will increase the population of the younger generation."

"Oh, okay." I said. "I think I got it now." I took a deep breath. "It's a man's obligation to stick his boneration in a woman's separation. This kind of penetration will increase the population of the younger generation." I paused for a moment. "Did I get it right?"

"Uh, yeah." He said. "I think you got it right that time."

"YES!" I cheered. "Oh, my mother would be so proud of me! You know if she was normal and not second runner-up for the cover of crack-whore monthly."

"Why is she only second runner-up?" Sarah asked.

"Because I think Liane Cartman has that title claimed for life." I laughed. "Nah, but seriously, my mom needs to get a handle on some of her shit."

"What do you mean?" Sarah asked, genuinely concerned.

"Well," I said. "she's always in her room cryin', or doped up on meds, or yellin' at me. She's just enablin' everyone around her to take advantage of her or me or Ikuto or Utau…"

"What do you mean by 'take advantage of'?" Sarah just instantly thought that when I said 'take advantage of' I meant it as a euphemism for rape. She's had Akiko and Chouko admit to being raped a couple of times while drunk before and in her mind it's not entirely out of the realm of possibility that I've been raped before, too. I know, it's my own fault for phrasing it like that, but I was drunk. I didn't know what I was saying and got by best friend panicked for nothing. I did apologize when she told me this part.

"Ah, she just lets people walk all over her." I said. "Especially Easter."

"Easter?" She said. "That name sounds familiar… I think my dad might be one of their investors."

"Well, congratulations." I said. "Your father is a bastard." I laughed.

"I already knew that." Sarah said. "But why do you say that.

"Anyone who works for or is involved with Easter is a bastard." I said. "Bastards who need to be taught a lesson."

"What do you mean?" Sarah asked. "What'd they do?"

"You wanna know what I've always wanted to do?" I asked, ignoring Sarah's question. "I've always wanted to go down there and fuck that building up. You know, just trash the place and give 'em a taste of their own medicine."

"Yeah, but what'd they do?" Sarah asked.

"You know what, let's do it." I said. "Let's go down there and fuck that building up."

"Aw, screw it." Sarah said. "I don't know what they did wrong, but obviously it's upsetting you and that's all the justification I need to do this." She turned her attention to everyone else. "You guys wanna do this, too?"

"What?" Shizuka said having not heard mine and Sarah's conversation at all.

"We're gonna go fuck up the Easter Building." Sarah said. "Want in?"

"Easter?" A puzzled Suzuki said. "Why?"

"Who cares why?" Sarah said. "All that matters is we're going to cause serious damage to someone else's property! Now who's with us?"

* * *

"Wait, wait, wait!" I said. "Hold up! I said what?"

"That you wanted to go down and fuck up the Easter Building." Sarah said again.

I started getting a sinking feeling.

"And you…"

"I asked if anyone wanted to join us."

"Please tell me everyone said no." I said desperately.

"Nah, they were all for it." Sarah said. "Except for Akiko, of course, she stayed behind but everyone else went. Oh man, you should have seen…"

At that point I stopped listening. Or, more like I couldn't listen. I froze. I still held the cell phone in my hand, but everything else went numb. I couldn't see. All I could do was retreat into myself and take in the information I just learned.

_It's my fault._ I thought. _I'm going to die._

I could feel myself hyperventilating and I felt like I was having a heart attack or something. I also started noticing that I had tunnel vision and felt like I was going to vomit.

_Panic attack_. I thought. I dropped the phone, leaving a concerned Sarah calling my name on the other end of the line. I ran into my bathroom and to the toilet. I knew I was gonna throw up eventually and wanted to be prepared for it when I did.

I stayed on the bathroom floor all night, worried about how Easter would react to my blatant defiance.

* * *

I spent a week trying to avoid Easter at all costs. That isn't something that's easy for me to do, seeing as I'm pretty much being held hostage by them. My contract with them says that if I leave the Kanto Region (For those of you who don't know, that's the Chiba, Gunma, Ibaraki, Kanagawa, Saitama, Tochigi, and Tokyo Prefectures.) or deliberately avoid them or act in a manner that casts them in a bad light and or ruins their business, they have the right to open the firing squad on my family. Why did I agree to that? Easy. I was eight and didn't know what I was agreeing to. I didn't read the contract before I signed it and I didn't get a lawyer to read it and see what I was agreeing to. I really wish I had, though. That would've saved me a lot of pain.

The first day I avoided Easter was spent in my bathroom. I locked myself in there when I had my panic attack and I was scared to go outside of the bathroom for an entire day after. I thought if I left there then a sniper would get a clear shot at me and take me out. So, I just spent the day staring at my eye floaters, picking at a loose string on my pajama shirt sleeve, and jumping at any noise I heard outside the bathroom. Eventually, I became so jittery that I had no other choice but to eat some of that chocolate Akiko gave me to calm down. Saw a lot of crazy things, man… Like fat women in G-strings with orange hair…

The second day, the furthest I went was the kitchen. After not eating for two days, you can imagine how hungry I was. I just got all the junk food I could out of the cabinets, brought it all upstairs and ate it all while watching _South Park_. I decided that if I'm gonna die, I might as well die with a full stomach, not seeing it coming at all, and while watching something funny.

The third day I tried venturing outside. I just walked to the convini and back but that was it. Once again, I was afraid of being sniped so I tried to avoid being out in the open as much as possible. The fourth day I was much more adventurous. I figured if they wanted me dead, I'd be dead by now so there'd be no point in hiding anymore. Days five and six went on like normal, and by day seven I actually believed I had gotten away with it.

That was until I was grabbed and pulled into a car while walking back to the house. I did try fighting back, but all that got me was a smack in the back of the head so hard I later found out that I got a concussion from it.

I was taken to the newly-repaired Main Easter Building. I asked the men in suits who grabbed me several times what the fuck they thought they were doing and where they were taking me, but they remained silent the entire time. They dumped me in Director Hoshina's office, saying nothing and leaving when they were dismissed.

For about ten minutes, the Director and I had an ice-cold staring contest until I finally decided I had just about enough of this.

"What do you want?" I finally asked.

"Tsukiyomi Marceline," He started. "Can you please tell me what your contract with us says?"

"My contract?" I said. "You're gonna have to be more specific. There's a lot of stuff in ther-"

"Oh, don't act like you don't know." The Director said. "I know you know the specific part of the contract I'm talking about. Now tell me what it says."

I sighed. "It says that if I do anything to terminate my employment by the Easter Corporation, you have every right to end the lives of my family members."

"That's right." He said. "Given your actions over the past several days, it gives me cause to question your intentions."

"My intentions?" I questioned.

"Yes." He said. "Now tell me, do you intend to leave the Easter Corporation."

"No." Was my immediate answer.

"Then what are your intentions, Marceline?" He asked that as his cold, grey eyes drilled a hole straight through my body. I had to take a minute to think it through before I spoke.

"My intentions are to…" This was hard for me to say. "…f-faithfully s-serve the Easter Corporation until the day I meet my demise." I had to say that. That was the only correct answer.

Apparently the Director believed my statement just enough to let me go, but not enough to very scarily warn me. His exact words were: "Remember the consequences, Marceline."

I… I'm scared.

* * *

**I bet when you clicked on this you thought it was going to be an April Fool's Day prank. Nope, not this year. Watch your backs next year though! LOL!**

**The top authors note is the chorus to the Eminem song "Asshole" off of _The_ _Marshall Mathers LP 2_. I got the CD over the weekend and have been playing it in the car non-stop ever since.**

**Yeah... These last two chapters... Not my best... But, we're getting back to the regular plot next chapter, so...**

* * *

**This was originally uploaded to the Hi no Nami Blogspot on 4/1/14**


	19. Bad CG

**Just heard about what happened in Fort Hood... So sad... My thoughts are with the families. 3**

**"Dynamite" by Taio Cruz**

* * *

"And now, it's magic time!" The child magician said to the viewers at home before turning to his guest assistant/volunteer, Hoshina Utau. "Your consciousness is separating from your body." He said as Utau stared at him in a seemingly dazed state. "You can hear only my voice. You can hear **only** my voice." Utau closed her eyes. "One, two, three." Zero, the magician, held a finger up in front of Utau's face with each number he said. He turned back to the cameras. "Utau-san is now completely under the effects of hypnotism. Now…"

Suddenly, the curtain behind them fell, revealing a huge lion. One of the guest judges/people on some sort of panel (You can tell I didn't pay attention to the beginning of the show.), Saeki Noboko, screamed in terror. Utau went around to the other side of the stage, and climbed up a flight of stairs that lead to a platform just above the lion's cage.

"Do not be alarmed!" Zero said to assure the audience before people had time to call the station and scream at them to stop the stunt immediately. "The instant Utau-san falls into this cage, I will transform her into a thousand butterflies with my magic!" Oh yes, a nine-year-old boy who can probably barely lift a medicine ball above his head was going to save my fifty-five kilogram-weighing sister with "magic". Now, you might be wondering what strength had to do with this? Easy. If that fucktard wasn't able to save her with "magic" then I would go down to the television studio myself and force him to catch her. Oh, and for those of you who think fifty-five kilograms isn't a lot, let me tell you, you are dead wrong. Utau tripped on the stairs once and landed on me and let me tell you it fucking hurt!

"It's magic time! It's Zero Time!" The magician exclaimed. Yes, kid. Enjoy your fun time with the television audience while I think up the most torturous way to kill you.

Utau started to slowly lean forward and…

**COMMERCIAL BREAK!**

Oh god damn it! I hate it when television stations/shows pull this shit. They build up the tension and right when something good (Or horrific, in my case.) is about to happen, they cut to commercial break. I was pissed and freaking out at the same time. I had to sit through commercials for Nationwide Insurance, _The Big Bang Theory_, Visit Florida Dot Com, Citizens Bank, Friendly's, _The King of Queens_, Neutrogena, and Chili's before I could find out whether or not my sister died a horrible death. I know, I always could have just called her but I know she keeps her phone off when she's doing something for work.

Utau was still standing on the ledge when they came back. Once again, she began to slowly lean over, only this time there was no commercial break to save her and she fell over the ledge. I let out a strangled scream, which was muffled by the throw pillow from the couch I was currently biting down on. However, my panic was seemingly for neigh because they filled in her falling into the cage with (cheap) CG Graphics. That didn't subdue my worry, though.

The end of the program was shot live (For whatever reason.) and you could clearly see that Utau was on the stage, alive and well, thanking the audience and Zero for having her on the show. It was only then that I let out a sigh of relief.

"What?" Ikuto, who was sitting next to me on the couch and watching, too. "You didn't think she was actually going to die, did you?"

"Well…" I trailed off.

* * *

"Cut!" The director shouted mid-fall. Utau landed in the net safely, just as planned. "We'll do the rest of the scene where Utau turns into butterflies in CG and then combine it."

Utau slowly stood up on the net and carefully walked to the edge where two crew members, a man and a woman, were waiting. She stepped on to the small metal, movable platform that was next to the net and then continued down the metal stairs.

"Thank you very much." The woman said as Utau passed her. Utau said nothing as she passed her.

"This is stupid" Utau said.

Across the stage, she saw Zero's manager arguing over the quality of the CG effects. Apparently they were dissatisfactory last time and he wanted them to be better this time. (Let me tell you, they weren't. You could clearly tell the butterflies were fake.) Meanwhile, Saeki Noboko was being dragged away by her managerial team because she was seeing things again. Okay, I take it back. That woman isn't just some wacko they found off the street, she's fucking delusional. God, if her managerial team had any sense they'd take her to get tested for schizophrenia. She was going off about Guardian Spirits or some other crap like that, saying that she could see them or whatever. Lady needs help.

"Thank you very much!" Zero's manager said as Noboko was led off stage. He then turned to Zero. "If you appear on her show, your popularity will skyrocket!" Apparently Zero's expression said that he didn't like that idea. "What's with that defiant look?"

"'Magic Time?'" Utau said from behind the distressed looking kid. He turned around to look at her. "Your tricks are all CG. You're nothing but a fake."

"What did you say?" Said Zero's now irate manager. "Where's your manager?"

"Has Utau done something wrong?" Yukari, who suddenly appeared to the manager's left, said. One thing that I like about Yukari, is that if some gets pissed at Utau for whatever reason and I'm not there and she overhears it, she'll pounce on them. Not that Utau isn't capable to stand up for herself 'cause she can, will, and has in the past, but it's just nice. Also, awesome bonus, whereas I would use an AK-47 to shut them up, she uses words, which is probably better for Utau's reputation.

"What kind of manners have you taught your client?" Um, Utau didn't learn her manners from Yukari. She learned them from the same woman who thinks it's appropriate to throw glassware at her son's head for no reason in the middle of dinner. (Don't worry. Ikuto's okay. He ducked.)

"What's the problem?" Yukari asked. "Utau's popularity will soon surpass Zero-kun's."

The two managers continued fighting, ignoring their clients.

"The entertainment world is the worst." Utau commented to Zero. He quickly turned to look at her. "I was looking forward to seeing you do magic firsthand, is all. I'm so disappointed." And with that, Utau walked away.

* * *

**Well, this chapter is shorter than my last few, but I got it out faster than normal, so can't complain. Especially since Utau is in it and Utau is tied with Ikuto for my favorite character from _Shugo Chara!_.**

**Oh, and to the people who watched episode sixteen of _Shugo Chara!_ recently, did anyone else notice how Nikaidou was able to lure a kid into his car in broad daylight without anyone noticing? I mean, he clearly wasn't the kid's parent or a relative of the kid so don't you think someone would have noticed something was up? I mean, granted, Nikaidou had no malintent (In the sense that he wasn't going to molest the kid then leave his severed head in the river for the cops to find.) but seriously? No one thought "That guy looks suspicious. I should call the cops."? Then again, it is Japan. They have a lower crime rate than we do so they probably let their guards down more... I don't know. **

* * *

**This was originally uploaded to the Hi no Nami Blogspot on 4/2/14**


	20. The Joker's Speech

**-What's your name?**

**-Shady.**

**-Who's your daddy?**

**-I don't give a fuck, but I wonder...**

**-Is he rich like me?**

**-Doubt it.**

**-Has he taken any time to show you what you need to live?**

**"Cooler Than Me" by Mike Posner**

* * *

"Watanabe-san," Director Hoshina said into his office phone. "get Logan Huntzburger in here, now."

"Right away, sir." Watanabe said. Within a few minutes Logan was standing in the Director's office.

"What seems to be the problem, sir?" Logan asked when he came in.

"You're close with Tsukiyomi Marceline, right?" The Director asked. If by close, you mean "Have you raped her?" then yes, we are close.

"I wouldn't say that exactly." Logan said. "It's more like mutual understanding." Or one-sided obsession.

"Whatever." The Director said. "I don't care what the details of your relationship to her are, I just want to know if you think you can control her."

"Sir?" Logan didn't comprehend.

"If that girl isn't kept under control," The Director explained. "she will be the downfall of this entire company. She knows way too much about our operations and business practices. It'd be unethical to kill her seeing as she's only eleven years old. Not to mention I'd be probably send myself to prison for life if I don't get the death penalty for doing that. So, I need someone like you, to control her. Do you think you can do that?"

Logan smiled wickedly.

"Why yes, sir. I'm sure I can."

* * *

It was a dark, gloomy, rainy day in the Kanto Region. The remnants of Tropical Storm Nakri were just hitting the Japanese coast. (Psh, a tropical storm in the last week of January and the republicans say that there's no scientific evidence to support Global Warming.) Needless to say many people remained inside and did everything they could to go outside in the torrential rain.

Nikaidou Yuu sat at his desk in his laboratory, entering information he had collected from the last two eggs he turned into X-Eggs into his computer. They belonged to professional snowboarder Tori Mifuyu and the child magician Zero.

"They were both prodigies, and they both produced splendidly powerful X-Eggs." Nikaidou said to himself. "I was able to gather magnificent data thanks to them."

**Briing.**

**Briing.**

His cellphone rang and he picked it up. He looked at the caller ID and gave a bit of a sigh.

"Hello?" He said as he answered.

"It's me." The Director said on the other end of the line. "It would appear you have yet to find the Embryo. How long are you going to make me wait?"

"Please don't be impatient." Nikaidou said. "My current plan is progressing as we speak. The day you'll be able to present the Embryo to Gozen is not far off."

"Your current plan?" The Director questioned.

"It's something no one could even imagine." Nikaidou said. "Let's just say a miracle is about to occur, and leave it at that."

"What kind of plan is it?" The Director demanded to know.

"I'll explain the details at another time." Nikaidou said before hanging up.

Nikaidou then got up and looked out the window to the gloomy atmosphere outside.

"I'll make an Embryo using the data I collected." Nikaidou exposed to the room which was devoid of other people. "Yes, with my own hands." Dramatic flash of lighting. "But before I do, I should get one more sample."

He walked over to five playing cards he had flipped face-side-down on his desk.

"I'll use the egg that is by far the most powerful as the test subject." He said as he chose a card. He picked the card that was in the center and flipped it over. It was a card with a black spade and the letter J and the same old illustration you would expect to find on a Jack Card in a Bicycle deck.

"My next target will be the Jack."

* * *

Yukari sat in the Directors office, arranging papers and putting them into her bag. She had just finished speaking to the Director about her plans with Utau. Nikaidou hadn't shown up. She didn't care for the most part, but a teeny-tiny part of her did wonder why. It wasn't like him to miss out on the weekly brown nosing session.

Apparently the Director wanted to know, too because he called Nikaidou.

"It's me." She heard the Director say. "It would appear you have yet to find the Embryo. How long are you going to make me wait?"

There was a pause.

"Your current plan?"

Another pause.

"What kind of plan is it?"

Then after a few seconds, the Director took the phone away from his ear and flipped it closed.

"Nikaidou," The Director said to himself. "what are you thinking?"

* * *

"I wonder what his plan is." Yukari said as she stared at the down pour out the window of the Taxi she and Utau were currently in.

"Nikaidou-san's?" Utau asked as she studied a piece of paper that most likely had song lyrics or something written on it. "Does it matter? I'm not interested in anyone who puts on a fake smile." She turned and looked out her own window. "I'm not, and neither is Ikuto."

* * *

I saw Ikuto standing in a back alley way. I was inside a Dunkin Donuts across the street with Sarah. I don't think he knew I was ther. I do think, though, he was trying to wade out the down pour. Either that or he was trying to commit suicide via pneumonia. I really wanna think it was the first thing, but given how depressed he looked…

I'm probably wrong, though.

…At least, I hope I'm wrong.

* * *

**So yeah dad let's walk. Let's have us a father and son talk. But I bet we probably wouldn't get one block without me knocking your block off. This is all your fault! Maybe that's why I'm always so bananas. I appeal to all those walks of like; whoever had strife. Maybe what dad and son talks are like. 'Cause I related to the struggles of Young America when their fucking parents were unaware of their troubles. Now they're ripping out their fucking hair again. It's a stare ruckle, I chuckle 'cause everyone bloodies their bare knuckles. Yeah, uh-oh, better beware knuckle heads. The sound of my hustle says don't knock. The doors broken it won't lock. It might just fly open, get cold cocked. You critics come pay me a visit. Misery loves company, please stay a minute. Kryptonite to a hypocrite. Zip your lip if you dish it but can't take it. Too busy getting stoned in your glass house to kick rocks, and you wonder why I lash out. Mister Mathers as advertised on the flyers. Spread the word 'cause I'm promoting my passion 'till I'm passed out. A completely brain dead Rain Man doing a bank head in a restraint chair. So bitch, if you shoot me a look it better be a blank stare or get shanked in the pancreas, I'm angrier than all eight of the reindeer put together with Chief Keef, 'cause I hate every fucking thing, yeah. Even this rhyme bitch, and quit tryna look for a fucking reason for it ain't there. But I still am a CRIMINAL! Ten year old degenerate grabbing on my GENITALS! The last Mathers LP that went Diamond, this time I'm predicting that this one will go EMERALD! When will the madness end, how can it when there's no method to the pad and pen. The only message I have to say is: Dad, I'm back at it again! Bitch. **

* * *

**Originally Posted to the Hi no Nami Blogspot on 4/7/14**


	21. The First Heir

**Happy Easter/Pot Day/Hitler's Birthday/Anniversary of the Columbine Shootings!**

**"Stereo Love" by Edward Maya and Vika Jigulina**

* * *

THUD!

"Ah, fuck!" I nearly screeched out. Although I had been awake no longer than three seconds, I was able to stop myself from waking up the rest of the house. It was about two in the morning. I had just woken from a nightmare. I'm not going to say what it was about, seeing as I have trouble breathing when I as much as even accidentally recall this nightmare. Just know that it was enough to send me into instant panic attack mode as soon as I recoiled from the foot-and-a-half to two-foot fall from my bed.

I pulled everything that was in my arms close to me as I sobbed. I had been cradling my teddy bear, Rupert, and my Stan and Kyle dolls. (I think Kenny was on the floor with my Webkins Panda and Cartman was somewhere on my bed with the rest of my stuffed animals.) I had a death grip on the comforter from my bed, which I guess I had pulled down with me. After a few minutes I realized I was cold and wrapped it around myself.

I cried for twenty minutes before I was able to calm myself down. (New record!) I still had slight tunnel vision and I still felt like someone was going to jump out from behind me with a machete, but at least I wasn't crying. After that, I tried going back to sleep, however, it evaded me. I could understand why, though. I mean, who could fall asleep after a dream like that? I think someone who wasn't used to having dreams as disturbing as that one would commit suicide immediately after waking up from that hell.

I know normal methods of falling asleep, such as drinking milk or taking a warm bath wouldn't help. I've tried those all before with no avail. I could always take some Ambien, or Lunesta, or Oxycodone, or Valium, or Sleep Syrup or… Wow, I know my mom's a pill junkie but I never realized how many different sleep medications she had at her disposal. Someone… Someone should really do something about that.

Anyways, I know I could always take one of those but I'm fairly certain despite the large number of medications that are probably in her system, she'd still somehow hear me and wake up. So, I'm left with very few options. To be honest, I want nothing more than to crawl into my parent's bed and curl up with them like I used to when I was I child. I think everyone did that as a kid when they were scared. Well, at least I did until I was about three and walked in on them… …Uh, participating in adult activities. Let's go with that. (Your parents are virgin saints, your parents are virgin saints, your parents are virgin saints…) After that extremely scarring incident, I started crawling into bed with Ikuto whenever I had nightmares. Although at age eight I doubt he could fight of the little fire demons that plagued my dreams and that I was convinced were real as well as my dad probably could, but I reasoned the most I would have to do should those things ever attack me in my sleep would be to outrun Ikuto.

Ikuto! I thought for a second. Oh shit, no. He would never let me do that again. Hell, I don't think I'm even allowed in his room. Not after that one time.

Let me elaborate. About a year and a half ago, Utau had seen this French film called Les Cousins Dengereux and got some ideas from it… Long story short, Ikuto said that no one was allowed in his room without his express written consent ever, ever, EVER, again. So, that's out.

For the rest of the night, I just stared at the ceiling waiting for sleep to come.

You know, I've heard suicide is painless…

* * *

Logan walked back into his office on Saturday morning. He saw that he had a new message on his answering machine. He sat down at his desk and hit the button that played all messages.

Beeep.

"You have one new message, and five saved messages." The Machine said in a monotone, robotic voice. "First new message."

"Hello, Mr. Huntzburger." A man said in the recording. "This is Minami Hinata calling about the inquisition you made to my legal office. Um, I have to say what you're asking for isn't exactly legal in Japan… In fact, it's not legal anywhere. It, uh, it actually borders on slavery… The best I can offer you is a non-disclosure agreement that would keep the girl from talking about… What you're planning to do… But other than that, legally, you don't have any leeway. I'm sorry sir. Have a nice day."

"To delete this message, press one…" The machine began to drone on.

Logan frowned.

* * *

"It's great weather for going to the aquarium!" Ran cheered.

"The aquarium! The aquarium! Our first time at the aquarium!" All the of Amu's Guardian Characters chanted in sing-song voices. Amu and the other Guardians had been invited by Tadase to go see the new Aquarium that had just been built. I don't see what the big deal was, though. It was exactly the same as the old was aquarium, only this one wasn't burned to ashes. I know what you're thinking, you're wondering how an aquarium caught fire. Well, if you can tell me how a Sea Parks could catch fire, I'll tell you how an aquarium can catch fire.

Amu smiled while listening to her Guardian Characters' excitement.

There's something nice about visiting the aquarium with friends. She thought. I'm excited.

Honey, let me tell you the only thing exciting about the aquarium is that you can point at the seals and scream "Hey kids! Look at the phoques!" then explain to them that "phoque" means "seal" in French and then watch all the little kids trying out this new word with their parents. At least, that's the only reason I find going to the aquarium exciting.

"Hinamori-san!" A slightly (Okay, more than slightly.) feminine voice called out from down the street. Tadase jogged over to the bus stop Amu was standing at.

"Good morning." Tadase said. "Sorry for making you wait."

"It's okay," Amu said. "no one else is here yet."

"Actually," Tadase said. "Just before I left the house I got calls from everyone…"

* * *

Tadase was just pulling on his tan jacket when the phone rang. He was the closest to it, so he just announced that he would get it.

"Hello," Tadase said in his normal, formal manner when he picked up the phone. "Hotori residence, Tadase Speaking."

"Hotori-kun?" Nadeshiko's voice said on the other end of the line. "I'm glad I caught you before you left the house. I'm sorry, I can't get out of dance practice after all. You'll tell Amu-chan and the others, right?"

"Oh, that's too bad." Tadase said. "I'll be sure to tell everyone."

"Thanks, bye." Nadeshiko said. She was being quick on the phone. Tadase just assumed that she had to get back to dance practice.

As soon as Tadase put the phone back on the receiver, he got another call.

"Hello," Tadase said again. "Hotori residence, Tadase speaking."

"Sorry, Tadase!" An overly hyper girl blurted out on the phone all of a sudden. "I have to go out with my family all of a sudden."

"Yuiki-san?" Tadase questioned for a second, but then decided that it probably her seeing as he hardly knew of anyone else who could blurt out so many words in less than fifteen seconds. "It's okay." He said. "Fujisaki-san called already and said she couldn't make it either. I'll tell everyone what happened."

"Na-chin already called?" Yaya questioned. "Yes! The plan is working!"

"Plan?" Tadase asked. "What plan?"

"Uh…" Busted! "Oh! I think my mom's calling me! Gotta go! Bye!" And just like that she hung up.

Any confusion Tadase had from that conversation was quickly brushed aside by the phone ringing again.

"Hello, Hotori residence, Tadase speaking."

"Hey, Tadase." Kukai said on the other end of the line.

"Soma-kun?" Tadase said. "What's up?" He asked that, but he could easily predict what he was going to hear next.

"Sorry." Kukai said. "A soccer match suddenly came up. I won't be able to go to the aquarium with you guys." How does a soccer match suddenly come up? Don't they plan those things months in advance? Tadase, however was oblivious to this.

"Oh, don't worry." Tadase said. "Yuiki-san and Fujisaki-san already called. They can't make it either."

"Oh, really?" Kukai said in a surprised tone that could easily be described as feigned to anyone but Tadase. "That sucks."

"Yeah." Tadase said. "So, I guess it's just me and Hinamori-san." He doesn't realize that's what they wanted, doesn't he?

After he hung up with Kukai, Tadase hung back for a minute to make sure he didn't get any calls from Amu. Obviously he didn't so he then grabbed his black hat and made his way to the bus stop that they were all supposed to meet at.

* * *

"So the others can't come." Tadase said when he finished explaining.

"What?" Amu and her Guardian Characters exclaimed.

"I was really looking forward to it, too." Amu said sadly.

In her mind, the aquarium was on a cloud, too far out of her reach. That didn't stop her imaginary self and the imaginary forms of her Guardian Characters from reaching out for it.

"Good-bye, aquarium." Amu's Guardian Characters said sadly in unison.

"Good-bye, dolphins-desu." Su said, especially sad.

"It can't be helped," Tadase said. "so let's just go together."

"Huh?" Amu said. She was expecting him to say that they could all just go another time.

"Ah, the bus is here." Tadase said as the bus pulled up.

* * *

Amu sat on the extremely nice city bus (I say extremely nice because all of the city busses I've been on have hard plastic seats and winos peeing in the corner and this bus had none of that.), staring straight ahead at the people in front of her. As she sat there, she came to a certain realization and her expression changed from neutral to one of shock, embarrassment, and panic.

I'm alone with Tadase-kun?! Wow, she finally figured that out? Someone call the Nobel Prize people! I think we have a genius on our hands!

Her Guardian Character, the pink cheerleader, Ran, flew over to her upon seeing her impending freak out.

"Calm down, Amu-chan." Ran said. But, it didn't help.

* * *

"Hey, Ikuto." Utau said, trying to wake him up from his nap. "Wake up, Ikuto."

Normally getting him to mumble something in his sleep is quite a feat, never mind waking him up. But, he was still in that state of slight alertness between falling asleep and waking up, so he was able to acknowledge her.

"No." He said. "I'm super sleepy."

"You've been acting funny lately." Utau said, worriedly. "Something's strange. Is it because of her? Hinamori Amu."

The name made Ikuto open his eyes a bit. Even though it was over a month ago, he could still clearly hear those words in his ears.

"I won't lose to you!"

He shut his eyes again. Not out of exhaustion, but in an attempt to get that memory out of his head.

"Are you paying attention to her because she has the lock that goes with your key?" Utau asked, clearly wanting an answer. "Or is it…"

Ikuto gave no reply. Utau just stared at him for a few seconds sadly. She then stood up, but before she could walk away, Ikuto's Guardian Character, Yoru, floated up to her.

"Hey, by key do you mean that?" He said pointing over to the key that was chained to the handle of his violin case. "What's the lock?" He continued. "What happens when you put the lock and key together-nya?"

"I have no idea." Utau said as she turned to walk away.

As she made her way over the roof door, Yoru turned his attention back to the key.

"A lock and key…" He said to himself while chuckling. "Could be fun-nya."

* * *

In the alley way between the Convini and the Dry Cleaners that was quite possibly a front for human trafficking, all of the stray cats in the Toride area had convened to listen to their "king" make an important announcement.

"Gentlemen," Yoru said, while holding up a poorly drawn picture of Amu and her Guardian Characters. "this girl is your target-nya! Go find her-nya!"

The cats all cheerfully meowed.

* * *

The Tonami Memorial Aquarium (Apparently it was named after some kid who died in the fire. Once again, I don't know how an aquarium could catch fire.) was… Well, an aquarium. I mean, it didn't have the "wow factor" that the New England Aquarium (The only other aquarium I've ever been to.) has. It just has blue walls, a tan floor, a bunch of in-wall tanks, and rooms for shows with somewhat bigger animals like phoques and dolphins. They didn't have any big animals, though, like whales or sharks. Well, they did have sand sharks, but not any shark sharks.

Despite looking very boxy on the outside, the aquarium was very elliptically shaped on the inside. The center ellipse was the stadium for the aquatic animals' shows and the external ellipse housed the in-wall tanks. Everything outside the external ellipse was just maintenance stuff. I never got this set up because of how compact the aquarium is, but I've never seen it over crowded (To be fair, I've never seen it under crowded either.) or heard of any serious problems occurring because of this set up, so I guess it works for them.

That Sunday, they were fairly busy. Once again, it wasn't overly crowded but you could tell the owners made a decent amount of money that day. It was mostly filled with parents with young children and young couples out on a "date". (I say "date" because if a guy ever took me to the aquarium and tried to call that a date, I'd laugh in his face. A date to me is going somewhere where they don't card and getting so drunk you'd fuck anything, even David Schwimmer. Eh, I shouldn't be hard on them. They're probably all fifteen or sixteen year olds that have no money.) They all puttered around the ellipse, staring at the wide variety of fish and wildlife that were living out the duration of their miserable little lives having to spend day in and day out being tortured in a tank by giant creatures that liked to tap on the glass of the tank.

While Tadase was looking at a brochure, probably trying to figure out where certain attractions were even though the building was probably the easiest to navigate in the world, Amu was freaking out.

"I-I can't believe I'm alone with Tadase-kun!" She said to herself.

"We're here as well." Kiseki pointed out in his usual arrogant tone.

"She's totally forgotten about us." Miki observed aloud.

"Amu-chan." Ran said, in slight disbelief.

"Where are the dolphins-desu?" Su asked cheerfully.

Amu had been staring into space as she internally freaked out, but then one of the many young couples caught her attention.

"Do you want to see what's over there?" The boy asked as the girl turned her attention from the tank.

"Sure, let's go look." She said as she grabbed his arm and they walked off to some other part of the aquarium.

My only comment on that is, god, I hope that boy wasn't planning on getting laid like that.

Woah, a date. B-but wait… Wouldn't this also be a date? No, Amu. A date is when the prospect of getting laid is on the table. What you just saw wasn't a date and what you and Tadase are on isn't a date. Unless, you want to psychologically scar yourself by losing your virginity at ten years old to a possible homosexual (I've known the kid since I was ten months old. Trust me, it's very much possible he's a homosexual.), I wouldn't see this as a date.

However, my words are being written long after the fact, so they have no effect on Amu. In her mind, there were hearts, glitter and streamers everywhere, there was a banner that said "Congratulations! First Date!" and Ran, Miki, and Su were playing trumpets.

God, is it okay for such a wonderful development to happen to me? YOU'RE TEN!

Amu turned and looked at Tadase and immediately began fangirling over him. (Gross.)

His hair's so silky. His eyes are so pretty. He's majorly cute again today. Alright, let me break it to you right now, honey. Tadase isn't attractive. (No offence, Tadase.) He's just… Normal. Also, you're only focusing on his physical attributes. Not that that's a bad thing, but if you really want this to work out… I'm reading too much into the situation, aren't I?

"Hinamori-san." Tadase suddenly said as he turned to her.

"Yes?" Amu said sweetly as she was still in heart-filled, sparkly fangirl land. However, she quickly realized that what just happened wasn't a fantasy, snapped out of it, and quickly covered her mistake. "I mean, what?"

"Shall we go?" Tadase asked as he started walking in the direction of one of the attractions.

"Yeah!" Amu said brightly as she caught up to him.

"The mood is good!" Ran commented.

* * *

After going through a montage of cute "date-ish" activities, Amu and Tadase were walking through the hallway of the outer ellipse, talking.

"Oh man," Amu said cheerily as she spread out her arms. "this is so much fun!"

"Everything is adorable!" Amu's Guardian Characters cheered.

"Now let's see the dolphins-desu!" Su excitedly exclaimed. What's with this girl and dolphins?

"Right, what should we see next?" Amu turned to Tadase and asked. And then for some reason I cannot comprehend, she started freaking out internally again.

Oh-no, I'm getting carried away! She thought. That's not like me. Tadase-kun will think I'm childish! What the hell does his opinion matter? Just enjoy yourself! God, I hate girls like this, (No offence, Amu.) the kind of girls who constantly worry about a guy's opinion of them. Just do what you feel is right and if they can't handle it, fuck them. What I just wrote is probably hypocritical, but I don't care.

But wait, the girl he likes… The memory suddenly came back to her…

"It was the first time I'd ever seen a girl so bright, cheerful, and strong! A girl like Amulet Heart!" Wait, it was Tadase that said that? Shit, I thought it was two lesbians talking.

In that case, maybe I should just transform into Amulet Heart. Amu thought about it for a moment, saw no horrible flaws in that plan, and then proceeded to go through with it.

"My own heart! Unlock!" Amu shouted. Seconds later she was in a pink cheerleader's outfit and time had turned back so she was back at the bus stop with Tadase waiting there for her.

"Sorry to keep you waiting!" Amu said ten times more cheerily than she was a few minutes before when she was talking with Tadase in the aquarium. Tadase's eyes immediately turned into hearts like an Anime Character's and took her hand and then proceeded to walk down the street to the aquarium, happily hand in hand. That was, until a crowd had gathered.

"There's a really tacky cheerleader here." One person said.

"Why is she at an aquarium?" Another asked.

Okay, there's no way I could do that. She thought as she realized the error in her logic. Okay, she didn't really do that, but she did honestly give some serious thought to it.

"Hey!" The Guardian Characters said, trying to bring Amu back to reality.

"Hinamori-san," Tadase said. "isn't it about time you returned to this world?"

"I'm sorry." Amu said, snapping out of her fantasy mode. "I was acting weird, wasn't I? Like, not my usua-"

"I'm glad you're having fun." Tadase cut her off. "I was worried. It's the first time I've ever been alone with a girl like this. I didn't want things to be dull or boring."

"Tadase-kun." Amu said.

"And since it was you, Hinamori-san…"

"What?"

"Because you're…"

Because I'm Amulet Heart? She mentally prepared herself to relive that heartbreak.

"Hinamori-san, I…" Tadase was suddenly stopped by a smaller hand grabbing his. He turned to look at the smaller creature that had just joined them. It was a little girl in a soft pink coat. Her hair was tied up into pigtails and her brown eyes were wide. She happily smiled up at him. Amu and Tadase just store at her, confused.

"W-who are you?" Amu asked the little girl.

* * *

After a few hours of sleeping on the roof, Ikuto felt… Well, definitely not well-rested as he was sleeping on concrete, but he definitely wasn't tired anymore. He stood up and stretched. Then, he looked over at his violin case and quickly noticed something was missing. He sighed.

* * *

Yoru floated in front of the aquarium with the Dumpty Key around his neck.

"So Hinamori Amu is here-nya?" He asked the cats that were gathered together on the ground below him. The cats all meowed affirmatively. "Good work-nya. As a reward, here's some catnip-nya!" He said as he pulled out a bag of catnip. The cats all meowed excitedly. Catnip is a rare commodity for stray cats.

"I can't wait to see what's going to happen-nya!" Yoru said to himself as he flew towards the aquarium.

* * *

The little girl in the pink coat came to a stop as she reached the end of the hallway. She turned around and called out to someone.

"Onii-chan, hurry, hurry!" She said.

"She's really taken a liking to you." Amu commented to Tadase as they slowly followed behind.

"This is troublesome." Tadase said. "I wonder if she's lost." No, parents just leave their small children alone at the aquarium all the time. That's not sarcasm, I'm serious. The few times I've been to the aquarium I've seen parents tell their two year old not to leave the building with anyone and if the situation didn't feel right to go to a member of the aquarium's staff, before leaving them alone. What the fuck? I mean, I get why they do that at Toys R Us but the aquarium?

As they caught up with the girl, they both noticed that she was staring up at Tadase in a cute, but somewhat unsettling manner.

"What's wrong?" Amu asked the girl.

"Are you two going out?" The girl asked. "Is she your girlfriend?"

That question caused the two of them to become extremely flustered.

"Of course not, we're just friends!" Tadase outright denied.

"That's right, just friends!" Amu agreed, then she realized what he just said. "Just friends?"

"I'm so glad, because I love you!" The little girl exclaimed as she hugged Tadase and made a face at Amu.

Why you little brat… Amu thought.

"What are you getting worked up about?" Miki asked.

"It's pathetic." Kiseki commented.

"We haven't gone to see the dolphins-desu." Su said. Seriously, what's with this girl and dolphins?

* * *

Meanwhile, Yoru had become distracted from his mission.

"That looks tasty-nya." He said as he watched thousands of fish swim by him through the tank glass.

* * *

"Onii-chan, you're really cool!" The little girl gushed.

"Thanks." Tadase said, obviously not taking her comments seriously.

Give me a break! Amu thought. Seriously, Amu, what are you getting worked up about? She's five! That's too young to be in a relationship. Hell, if you ask me, ten is too young to date! Yeah, that's probably hypocritical coming from me because I started dating when I was eight, but that's the only relationship I've been in and the guy I was dating at the time was twenty-six so technically it wasn't a relationship, it was rape. But, that's beside the point.

"You know what?" The little girl asked Tadase. "This morning, on TV, I saw Saeki Noboko's Lucky Colors Fortune Telling. She said my destined partner would be wearing black shoes and a beige coat." Exactly what Tadase was wearing. "So you're my destined partner!"

"Um, what should we do?" Tadase turned to Amu and asked. Amu sighed.

"Her parents must be looking for her." Amu said. "We should take her to the Lost Children Center." Amu then looked at the little girl and saw that she was giving her a very pissed off look. "W-what?"

All of a sudden the little girl and Amu were dramatically standing on a cliff, with volatile sea waters below. Amu, of course, was confused.

"You're a bad lady who wants to break us up!" The little girl accused. "But our love can beat anything!"

"Huh?" Amu said as the little girl dramatically turned to walk off. Once she walked off she went back to hugging Tadase and the background changed back into the aquarium. Ah, the wonders of Amu's Inner Mind Theater.

"Amu-chan, Amu-chan!" Ran called out as she, along with Miki and Su, floated over to a disheartened looking Amu.

"What is it?" Amu asked sadly. "Is it already time for the dolphin show?"

"No, it's not that!" Ran exclaimed.

"Look!" All three Guardian Characters shouted as Miki and Su lifted Amu's head up while Ran pointed in the direction of the thing that had gotten them all worked up.

Floating above the heads of all the people in the crowd, was an X-Egg.

"Muri, Muri…"

"A-an X-Egg!" Amu exclaimed.

"Why is it here?" Tadase wondered aloud in a serious tone.

"What should we do, Tadase-kun?" Amu asked, also in a serious tone.

"What is it?" The little girl asked. "What's wrong?" Unlike Tadase and Amu, she couldn't see the X-Egg. As far as she knew, they were just staring at some mystery object near the ceiling.

As soon as it noticed that Amu and Tadase had their attention fixed on it, the X-Egg flew off. Tadase and Amu let out clearly audible gasps.

"We have to catch it!" Tadase exclaimed as he took a step forward, but was stopped by something grabbing at his coat.

"Onii-chan, don't go!" The little girl commanded. Oh, I guess Tadase forgot about her.

"Chisa-chan." Tadase said. Oh, look Amu! He remembered that little girl's name! You gonna get all jealous over that, too?

"Leave this to me." Amu said to Tadase. (Apparently not.) "You have to take care of her." And with that, she ran off in pursuit of the X-Egg.

"Hinamori-san." Tadase said as he watched her run off.

* * *

Yoru was trailing behind an aquarium employee who was apparently bringing a bucket of fish somewhere out back. The succulent smell of dead mackerel was so alluring to him, he couldn't help but to follow the guy and wait for him to drop one.

"That looks so tasty-nya!" Yoru could already imagine the salty and mercury-like (I can't eat fish, so I don't know what it tastes like.) taste of those little suckers and how satisfying it would be to have them slowly be disintegrated into nothing by the volatile acids in his stomach.

He was quickly distracted, though, by a black egg with a white X on it and the pink-haired ten-year-old girl chasing after it.

"Nya!" Yoru exclaimed. "Hinamori Amu, I've found you-nya!"

* * *

"Amu-chan, Chara Nari-desu!" Su instructed Amu.

"But…" Amu said, glancing around her surroundings. "I can't do it here with so many people around!" There were a total of seven people hanging out behind the building. Seven. That is not a lot of people, Amu. Plus, most of them were either talking to someone or playing some stupid game on their iPhone, so I doubt they would have noticed.

"Then Character Change!" Ran said. Alright, if she's worried about getting noticed by a total of seven people who aren't even paying attention to what's going on around them enough to notice that they're being pickpocketed by an eleven-year-old elementary school expellee (What? People at aquariums are easy targets.), how do you think a Character Change would be better?

"Right, that I can do!"

…

With that, the red X-shaped clip in Amu's hair turned into a heart-shaped one and tiny wings appeared on her wrists and the back of her ankles.

"Hop! Step! Jump!" Ran exclaimed as Amu jumped into the air in an attempt to catch up with the X-Egg. When the egg saw Amu floating down from the peak of her jump, quickly catching up to it, it began to panic and flew away faster. Once she reached the bottom of her jump, Amu grabbed a net that was just leaning up against the side of the building and continued to go after it.

"We're just going to borrow it for a while-desu!" Su assured no one.

Amu tried several times to swing her net and catch the X-egg, but each attempt was a comedic failure. After that, the egg got cocky and seemingly gloated at the fact that Amu had yet to catch it.

"It's as if…" Ran started.

"I get the feeling its making fun of us." Miki finished. Well, duh.

"That makes me mad." Amu said as she began to lunge at it again.

"Hinamori Amu-" Yoru began to say as he floated in of Amu, but she cut him off.

"Hey, watch out!" She said as her forehead slammed into the small creature.

"Ouch…" They both simultaneously groaned. Oh, come on! It shouldn't have hurt that bad!

"Why are you here?" Amu suddenly burst out and said once the slight pain from the bump vanished. "Does that mean Ikuto's here, too?"

"Ikuto isn't with me." Yoru said. "I'm a stray cat character who loves his freedom-nya." He tried to make that last part come off as cool and as bad ass as possible.

"Quit trying to act cool." Ran said.

"He kind of is, though." Miki commented in sort of a shy fangirl-like manner. This comment apparently shocked Ran.

"Have you been overcome by my charm?" Yoru asked. Just then the X-Egg decided to bounce on his head. This caused Yoru to fall forward and do a front flip before Amu caught him in hear hands.

"Are you okay?" Amu asked.

"I-I'm fine-nya." Yoru said, although he didn't sound fine. He sounded like Ikuto did that time he fell off the roof and that time he got the wind knocked out of him and couldn't breathe correctly for several minutes.

As Amu looked at Yoru, she immediately noticed the key around his neck.

"That's…" Amu muttered to herself. Yoru heard this and was immediately well enough to float up on his own.

"This is the key that can open your lock-nya." Yoru explained as he held the key at arm's length.

"The key that can open the Humpty Lock?" Amu asked in astonishment. "It's pretty!" She commented. Amu then reached into the little red bag she had attached to her belt and pulled out the Humpty Lock.

"The design looks pretty similar." Miki said, mentally noting that both the lock and key had the same four-leaf-clover shaped gems.

"The go together-desu." Su said. Well, duh.

"I'll open the lock-nya." Yoru said.

"Okay." Amu said.

Yoru slowly floated over to Amu's hand, which contained the lock. It was at the same time that the X-Egg realized that Amu had stopped chasing it and became immediately enraged and charged towards them. Su immediately noticed this and screamed. Everyone quickly directed their attention to the direction in which Su was looking. It was quick enough to allow them all to dodge the hit. The X-Egg floated around them at a fast speed multiple times, and they all scrambled to dodge it.

"What is it now?" Amu asked once the egg ceased its attack.

"Maybe it's mad because you were ignoring it." Miki suggested. Just as she said that, Yoru noticed something.

"The key is gone!" He exclaimed. Everyone looked up and saw that the key was now around the egg, and the egg once again began to cockily gloat. Wait, how is that possible? An egg is an ellipse. How could the chain of the key possibly… Oh yeah, I forgot. Physics don't exist.

"Nya!" Yoru exclaimed. "Ikuto's going to be so mad."

"Ikuto?" Amu questioned. "That was Ikuto's?" Why else would Yoru have it?

Why would Ikuto have the key that opened my lock? Amu thought. Maybe because it belongs to him?

"Amu-chan!" Ran exclaimed, quickly drawing Amu's attention back to her surroundings in just enough time to see the extremely pissed off X-Egg rushing at her.

"Hold on! Time Out!" Amu shouted, realizing she wouldn't have enough time to Character Change again and jump away.

Amu suddenly felt herself being picked up, held in the bridal position and then rising up off the ground fast enough to dodge the hit from the X-Egg. Amu looked at the face of her rescuer and saw a boy with navy-blue hair and midnight blue eyes.

Ikuto?

The X-Egg, pissed off by the fact that it missed Amu, quickly floated off to another part of the aquarium.

Ikuto gently set Amu on solid ground. She just stood there. She was unsure of what to say to him.

"Ikuto!" Yoru exclaimed as he floated over to his bearer.

"Jeez," Ikuto said, sounding extremely annoyed as he turned to Yoru. "taking off with someone else's stuff… Here's your punishment." As he said that last part, he flicked Yoru on the nose. Yoru gave a tiny yelp of pain as he gripped his nose. "I'll get the key back."

A pair of cat ears appeared on Ikuto as well as a tail before he jumped off in pursuit of the X-Egg.

Did Ikuto save me? Are you still alive? Then yes.

"Amu-chan, let's go, too!" Ran said.

"Yeah!" Amu exclaimed. "My Own Heart, Unlock!"

* * *

Ikuto jumped from tree top to tree top and building to building as he followed the X-Egg. For a second, he had it cornered in an alleyway between the aquarium and some public park area, but the egg evaded him by floating up on to the roof. He jumped up after it. As he began to reach the top of the building, he noticed someone jumping next to him. A girl in a pink cheerleader outfit. He looked over at her.

"Amu." He said.

She looked over at him and smiled in response.

They both reached the height of their jumps and landed on the roof safely.

"Good." Amu said as they landed. "I won't stand out in my Chara Nari here!"

"Okay!" Miki and Su agreed.

Once again, I would like to make a point that that same day I stole five-thousand-dollars' worth of credit card information off of people at that same aquarium. Trust me, they wouldn't have noticed. The only way they would have noticed would be if she actually went inside the aquarium and continued on with her date with Tadase like it was normal.

"You're going to get the key back, right?" Amu asked Ikuto. "I'll help you."

"Why?" Ikuto asked with that signature smirk on his face. "I thought you hated me."

"What?" Amu said, slightly confused. "Hate you? Oh…" Then she remembered what she had said.

"I hate you!" She had shouted. "I hate you!"

"Back then, I…" She became flustered as she tried to cover up her mistake. "Ah! You're right. This is just in return for saving me earlier; otherwise I'd have no reason to want to help you." Yeah, you keep telling yourself that, sweetheart.

Ikuto faked a look of disappointment, before smirking again.

"I really do hate you!" Amu exclaimed.

"Whatever." Ikuto said, still slightly smirking. "We better move fast before it takes off."

The X-Egg had been trying to take off, but stopped in its tracks once it heard Ikuto say that.

"Oh yeah," Amu said. "I forgot."

The X-Egg seemed depressed for a second upon hearing that.

* * *

Thousands of fish swam overhead as Tadase and Chisa walked through the giant glass tunnel tank that from the basement, which had large tanks for phoques and dolphins, to the stairs that led to the ground level floor where the Lost Child Center was sure to be.

"Chisa-chan, is your mother or father here?" Tadase asked.

Chisa suddenly let go of Tadase's hand and stepped in front of him.

"Don't mention my parents!" Chisa shouted. "I don't need my mother or father anymore."

"What?" Tadase said, astonished that a five-year-old whose name wasn't Marceline could say such a thing.

"As long as you're with me, everything is fine." Chisa said in a somewhat romantic-like tone. "Let's go live by ourselves in a far-off city." Wow, is this little girl lucky her "destined mate" wasn't several years older with a preference for small children.

* * *

Amu had tried several times to catch the egg to no avail. She was now floating in the air above the aquarium extremely pissed off with the egg.

"Jeez, it never stops moving!" She exclaimed.

"Amu-chan!" Miki exclaimed.

"Stay calm-desu." Su said.

All of a sudden, a giant, blue cat's paw batted at the egg in a manner that a real cat would. The egg easily dodged it. Amu looked over at Ikuto and saw him standing on a roof of the main aquarium building, using his Phantom Claw ability.

"Ikuto will distract it so you can hit it." Yoru explained.

"Got it!" Amu said.

Ikuto then batted at the egg as fast as he could and each time the egg dodged. It was so distracted by Ikuto that it didn't notice Amu using her Heart Rod's Spiral Heart attack. The rod span around the egg, trapping it in a barrier of sparkles.

"Got it." Amu said to herself, before calling upon her final attack. "Negative Heart! Lock On! Open Heart!" With that, the egg was hit with a thousand sparkling hearts until it turned back to normal.

Amu jumped down onto the roof of the aquarium and changed back to normal, just in time to see the egg drop the key.

"I got it! I got it!" Amu exclaimed as she ran after the key.

Ikuto realized what was going to happen before Amu or any of her Guardian Characters did. As she reached out and caught the key, she leaned over the ledge and began to fall. Ikuto quickly ran over and grabbed her by the arm, only to be pulled down with her.

"Amu-chan!" Amu's Guardian Characters exclaimed.

"Ikuto!" Yoru shouted.

Ikuto quickly pulled Amu into his arms so that way he was carrying her bridal style again and flipped so that way he landed on his feet. He let out a sigh of relief as he and Amu landed on the ground safely. Amu jumped out of his arms.

"D-don't scare me like that!" Amu said in her usual cool and spicy manner.

Ikuto smirked as he undid the Character Change.

"Thanks." He said. Amu turned to look at him and saw that he was holding up the key.

"Wait!" She exclaimed. "Is what Yoru said true? Can that key open my lock? What is this lock? And why do you have the key that opens it?"

"I don't know." He wasn't being as evasive as he seemed. He really didn't know.

"The least you could do is tell me." Amu said. "You're always like this; you never tell me the important stuff. Like, why didn't you tell me you weren't the one turning everyone's eggs into X-Eggs?"

"Who cares about that?" He said in an uncaring manner.

"I do!" Amu shouted as she ran at him with her hand in the air as if she was about to strike him or something. Ikuto caught it and held it in place above her head.

"Aren't you going to thank me for jumping down and saving you?" Ikuto asked with a smirk reappearing on his face.

"W-who'd thank…" Amu found herself unable to finish that sentence as she gazed into his eyes.

Oh-no, what is this strange feeling? She thought.

"The Dumpty Key." Ikuto said, snapping Amu out of her thoughts. "It's the key to your Humpty Lock."

"The key to…" Amu said. "My lock and your key go together?" Shit, didn't you figure that out, like, twenty minutes ago?

"Hinamori-san!" A feminine voice shouted. Christ, does he still have that sand in his vagina?

"Tadase-kun!" Amu said as she twisted her head around to look at Tadase. Ikuto let go of Amu's hand and took a step back. Tadase immediately ran to Amu's defense.

"Are you okay?" Tadase asked Amu.

"I'm fine." Amu said.

Tadase turned his attention back to Ikuto.

"Tsukiyomi Ikuto!" He said.

"You're looking well, kiddy king." Ikuto said, smirk still glued to his face.

"You're after the lock again!" Tadase (falsely) accused. Ikuto just turned around and started to walk off. "We'll never give it to you! I'll protect the Humpty Lock!"

"You're so adorable." Ikuto said as he came to a stop.

"Shut up!" Tadase shouted.

"But you, the lock might not be all I'm after." Ikuto said.

"Huh?" Amu said as she looked at Ikuto with a curious look.

What else could he be after?

Tadase, however, kept the same look of determination on his face.

"Tsukiyomi Ikuto, you're…" He trailed off as Ikuto Character Changed and jumped up onto a street lamp.

"See you later, Amu." He turned to her and said before jumping off.

"Wait!" Tadase called after him, but it was too late. He was already gone.

After standing there silently for a moment, a thought struck Amu.

"I just remembered!" Amu said. "What about the little girl? What happened to Chisa-chan?"

"Oh," Tadase said. He was glad that the subject changed but still felt weird about what had happened with that little girl. "I ended up finding her parents. Though, it was a bit difficult." By difficult, he meant she threw the temper tantrum to end all temper tantrums. "She finally calmed down after I promised to go on a date with her."

That little imp.

"Hey, Amu-chan." Ran said. "We've finished taking care of the X-Egg, so…"

"Let's go see the rest of the aquarium!" Miki said, finishing Ran's sentence.

"We must hurry, before the dolphin show starts-desu!" Seriously, what's with that girl and dolphins?

Right, I can't lose to that kid. I have to enjoy my first date as much as I can!

"Hurry! Hurry!" Ran, Miki, and Su called as they floated down the path towards the aquarium. Amu ran to catch up with them.

"Let's go, Tadase-kun!" Amu said, turning to Tadase once she reached her Guardian Characters, then quickly taking off once she finished her sentence.

Tadase just stood there for a second with a slight blush on his face.

"Tadase, what is the matter?" Kiseki asked.

"Nothing." Tadase said. Tadase began to walk in the direction Amu went when a small hand grabbed his. He turned around and saw Chisa staring up at him. "Ch-Chisa-chan?"

"What?" Amu said in disbelief. She had walked back to see what was taking him so long.

"I just…" Chisa began saying in a melodramatic manner. "I just couldn't leave you, Tadase!"

"And she's suddenly calling him by name!" Amu freaked out. Once again Amu, she's five.

The little girl saw Amu freaking out and cast a "He's mine, back off" glare at her.

"I give up." Amu said, collapsing on the ground. "I've been defeated."

Amu's Guardian Characters gathered around her. Ran and Miki told her to hang in there and that she shouldn't give up now while Su reminded her that if they didn't leave now, they'd miss the dolphin show. Meanwhile, Tadase tried to calmly convince Chisa to go back to her parents.

And so ended Hinamori Amu's "first date".

* * *

**END OF PART II**

* * *

**Yeah, I don't get why they put Easter on this date. I mean, I get that it's the first Sunday after the first full moon of the Vernal Equinox or something like that, but seriously, so much terrible stuff happened on this date. Couldn't they have done this last Sunday?**

**Also, I don't fucking care anymore if I get a cease and desist letter for writing this shit. I'm just gonna keep writing this until someone threatens to sue.**

**Anyways, see you in Part III.**

* * *

**This chapter was originally posted to the Hi no Nami Blogspot on 4/20/14 **


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